Altruism can no longer support community-based training

To the Editor: The article by McGrath and colleagues summarised neatly the challenges facing medical education in Australia.1 One solution suggested by Crotty for meeting the training needs of medical students at a time of increasing student numbers and decreasing numbers of hospital inpatients is to move a greater proportion of medical education into the community.2 Internationally, many medical schools are adopting a more community-based curriculum,3 while in Australia, students are spending a greater proportion of their time in general practices and other community settings.