To the Editor:

In “When a Physician Practice Management Company Comes Calling” (June 1998), the consultants made one message very obvious: There is no reason, consistent with the professional goals of family physicians, for a PPMC to buy a primary care office. As Nathan Kaufman said, “The problem is that after you pay expenses and legitimate compensation to the physicians, there's no money left over.”

Doctors must remember that in medicine, profit is the fuel; in business, profit is the goal. No PPMC or hospital will willingly allow a practice to lose money or provide less than a constant 15 percent return. Once the goals of the doctors and the owners clash, guess whose goal will be primary.