me private medical and dental practice was brought about. Negotiations for the formation of a Dental Group were completed in January 1952; and a co-partnership of dentists, styled the Los Alamos Dental Group, took over the dental-clinic space in the new building under a fiveyear lease with the Medical Center and, concurrently, the responsibility for providing pro- fessional dental services to the community of Los Alamos. At about the same time, the first three physicians to establish private practices in the Medical Center left the employ of the corporation and began the leasing of space in the building; one was a surgeon, one a pediatrician, and one an obstetrician, During the ensuing months to the end of the fiscal year 1952, the remaining salaried physicians either completed lease arrangements for pri- vate practice in the Medical Center or departed, Thus, at the beginning of the fiscal year | 1953, the conversion from salaried practice to private practice was complete. The continuing efforts of the members of the Medical Staff of the Medical Center and of the organization's Board of Trustees to recruit a full complementof highly-qualified physi- cians to serve the Los Alamos community on a private-practice basis resulted, by the Summerof 1953, in bringing the number of practitioners to what, with one exception, is regarded as the desirable minimum strength, In September 1953, the lessees included two surgeons, two obstetricians, three pediatricians, and three practitioners in the field of internal medicine (with a fourth likely to arrive next January). An ophthalmologist still is lacking, but negotiations are under way with a qualified specialist in the field of eye-care. In addition to these independent practitioners, the Medical Center employs a professional radiologist and continues to have the half-time services of a pathologist, the latter by arrange- ment with the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, The number of Medical Center employees has been further reduced, in part by the separation of the doctors, dentists, and supporting clinic personnel, to a total of 118 fulltime and 4 part-time employees on July 1, 1953. This reduction reflects some streamlining of Medical Center activities following the "shakedown" period in the new building and the conversion from salaried practice to private practice. Greater attention is being given by the Board of Trustees, the Medical Center Administrator, and the field office staff concerned with the administration of community-service contracts to ways and means of improving efficiency and accomplishing further economies in cost of operations. The membership of the Board of Trustees was changed in June 1953, by amendment of the corporation's by-laws, to nine residents of Los Alamos, elected for three-year staggered terms. On July 1, 1953, themembers, although elected as individuals, included three Scientific Laboratory officials, two executives and a craftsman employee of the Zia Company, two housewives, and an operator of acommercial establishment. Significant program developments during the fiscal year 1953 included the rapid establishment and activation of a Poliomyelitis Treatment unit within the Medical Center organization inthe Fallof 1952 when polio swept the country and reached a very high rate of incidence in New Mexico; and the launching of a Radiation-Therapy section in the Radiology department, » which made possible the administration of new therapy procedures to victims of cancer and certain non-cancerous diseases susceptible to treatment by radiation. The poliotreatment work was undertaken at the specific request of State officials of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis and was relied upon by that organization to provide expert care and therapy for acute cases of poliomyelitis that arose throughout the state; no other specialized hospital facility of the kind was available in the State of New Mexico for general ‘patients, The unit, fortunately, could be deactivated in the Spring of 1953 and has since been on a stand-bybasis. soa AL&9 onan . [Ny 30