Primary Care Physicians Performing Biopsy Procedures

Abstract

To the Editor. —We read with great interest the editorial in the July issue of theArchives, Is It Appropriate for Primary Care Physicians to Perform Skin Biopsies? by Weinstein and coworkers. 1 The authors discuss the issues involved with performing procedures commonly utilized by both primary care and physicians. Our concern is the bias expressed at the beginning of their editorial, which states that skin biopsy is traditionally a subspecialty procedure. Generalist physicians have been performing skin biopsy procedures for many years and, certainly, prior to the development of subspecialties. The tradition of this procedure clearly lies with generalist physicians. Although much primary care training is relatively new, and there are controversies regarding the extent of training in procedures for new primary care physicians, a procedure such as skin biopsy is fundamental to the generalist physician. Skin biopsy is an essential procedure taught to family practice residents.