MEDICAL SCHOOLS: U.S. NEWS RELEASES NEW RANKINGS

      Students at "[p]rogressive medical schools" are now being
 taught "interviewing skills and managed care principles alongside
 standard courses like anatomy," according to U.S. NEWS & WORLD
 REPORT's cover story, "America's Best Graduate Schools."  "And
 that's just as well, since most future physicians will be
 employed by a health maintenance organization or will work in a
 practice that deals with a variety of insurers, each with managed
 care components" (Brink, 3/10 issue).  U.S. NEWS divided the
 nation's 125 medical schools into two categories:  research,
 which included all 125 schools; and primary care, which included
 the 62 medical schools that graduated the highest percentage of
 primary care physicians.
      THE RANKINGS:  Harvard University, with an overall score of
 100, was the top research medical school, followed by Johns
 Hopkins University (99.7), and Duke University (95.2).  The
 University of Washington (100) was the top primary care medical
 school, followed by Oregon Health Sciences University (89.7) and
 the University of New Mexico (86.0).  Harvard was the top school
 for internal medicine, women's health, pediatrics and drug and
 alcohol abuse specialties.  Johns Hopkins was tops for
 geriatrics; the University of Washington for rural care and
 family medicine; and the University of California at San
 Francisco (UCSF) ranked best for AIDS research.  The schools were
 ranked based on student selectivity, faculty resources,
 reputation, research activity and their primary-care rate.
      MORE HEALTH PROFESSIONS:  The top three schools for health
 services administration were the University of Michigan-Ann
 Arbor, Northwestern University's Kellogg business school, and the
 University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.  The top public health
 schools were Johns Hopkins, Harvard and UNC-Chapel Hill.  UCSF,
 the University of Texas-Austin and the University of Kentucky
 were ranked as the best pharmacy schools (3/10 issue).