• Perez Home
• Foreword
• Biographical Sketch- Jose Perez
• Table of Contents
•     A Day in the Hospital
•     The Allergist
•     The Alternative Practitioner
•     The Anesthesiologist
•     The Bureaucrats of Medicine
•     The Chiropractor
•     The Dentist
•     The Dermatologist
•     The Emergency Room
•     The Family Practitioner
•     The Internist
•     The Neurologist
•     The Nurse
•     The Obstetrician
•     The Opthalmologist
•     The Orthopedist
•     The Otorhinolaryngologist
•     The Pathologist
•     The Pediatrician
•     The Pharmcologist
•     The Plastic Surgeon
•     The Podiatrist
•     The Psychiatrist
•     The Public Health Doctor
•     The Radiologist
•     The Surgeon
•     The Urologist
•     The Veterinarian
•     A Day in Court
• Sketches in Pencil

The Bureaucrats of Medicine

The Bureaucrats of Medicine by Jose Perez
(Oil on Canvas, 24 in x 30 in, 61.5 cm x 77 cm)

Copyright: This image may not be saved locally, modified, reproduced, or distributed by any other means without the written permission of the copyright owners.

"The Bureaucrats of Medicine" is Perez' most politically correct painting in this series. Over twenty-five percent of U.S. health-care costs go toward pushing paper. Government workers, insurance reimbursers, social-care providers, legal eagles, accountants, record keepers, receptionists, secretaries, and the members of associations, societies, and foundations, make up a larger group than doctors, nurses, pharmacologists, and therapists combined. The bureaucratic tail is wagging our health-care dog.

Perez' satirical genius comes through at its best in the centrally placed, villainous puppeteer, a caricature of Dickens' Scrooge, impairing the doctor and manipulating the puppet patients. While the nurses are helplessly buried in paperwork, the bureaucrats in Washington are above it all and arrogantly toasting their own good health. The chap riding the paper airplane enjoys it all, and is not the least bit bothered by the salvage yard of patients or the environmental destruction behind him. He must be one of the ubiquitous third-party providers, pragmatically capable of adjusting to the changing winds of medical economics.