The charm of history and its enigmatic lesson consist in the fact that, from age to age, nothing changes and yet everything is completely different. —Aldous Huxley
Looking at the lineup in the 2011 Compendium of Federal Medicine, I’m struck by how much medicine, especially federal medicine, has embraced the challenges and benefits of the 21st century while grappling with some of the same issues that plagued healers in the 19th century—and long before.