Relman, Arnold S.

Arnold S. Relman is Professor Emeritus of Medicine and of Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He has been a medical research scientist, a clinical practitioner and consultant, a medical-school teacher and department head, a university and medical-school trustee, the editor of two influential medical journals, a writer on medical and healthcare policy issues, and a member of a state board of licensure and discipline.

Born in New York City in 1923, Relman graduated from Cornell University in 1943 and received his medical degree from Columbia University in 1946. After residency training at Yale-New Haven Hospital, he moved to Boston in 1949 to be a National Research Council Fellow in the Medical Sciences at Boston University School of Medicine. He remained on the Boston University faculty, rising to the position of Conrad Wesselhoeft Professor of Medicine and Director of the Boston University Medical Services at the Boston City Hospital. From 1962 to 1967, he served as the editor of the Journal of Clinical Investigation. In 1968, he moved to Philadelphia to become the Frank Wister Thomas Professor of Medicine and chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and Physician-in-Chief at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. In 1975–1976, he was a Macy Foundation Faculty Scholar at Oxford University, England, and a visiting scientist in biochemistry at Merton College, Oxford. In 1977, he returned to Boston to become the editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, and senior physician at the Brigham and Women's Hospital. In 1991, he became Editor Emeritus of the New England Journal of Medicine and professor of medicine and of social medicine at Harvard University. In 1994, he became Professor Emeritus. From 1995 to 2001, he was a member of the Massachusetts State Board of Registration in Medicine and chair of its committee on quality.

Relman began his career as a medical research scientist and clinical practitioner and teacher. His research focused on renal disease and physiology and on fluid and electrolyte metabolism. He published many original studies that contributed to the understanding of the regulation of acid-base balance by the kidney, the renal effects of potassium depletion, and the diagnosis and treatment of kidney disease. He became a leader in academic medicine, serving as president of major national organizations such as the American Federation for Clinical Research, the American Society of Clinical Investigation, and the Association of American Physicians (the only person to hold all three positions) and as a member of the Council of the National Academy of Sciences, Institute of Medicine (IOM).

When Relman assumed the editorship of the New England Journal of Medicine in 1977, his primary interest shifted to healthcare policy and issues of medical professionalism. Since then, he has written widely on the economic, ethical, legal, and social aspects of healthcare and the practice of medicine. In 1980, he published a seminal article, “The New Medical-Industrial Complex,” which first called attention to the growing commercialization of medical care in the United States and its consequences. In many articles since then in professional journals and in the lay media, he has continued to explore this theme. Relman has also [Page 1033]been interested in the ethical and professional principles that govern the writing, editing, and publishing of medical research reports. He was a cofounder, in 1978, of the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, which has promulgated influential guidelines in this area.

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