Respiratory Therapists

To the Editor: Dr. Miles (N Engl J Med 294:399, 1976) asks about respiratory therapists. Respiratory therapists and technicians are being trained to work under the direction of physicians. This training is part of the ethical code of members of the American Association for Respiratory Therapy (AART). Therefore, it is the physicians who hire them who determine their “scope of responsibilities.” There are hospitals, however, in which no physician either is willing or knows enough to assume responsibility for respiratory therapy. Such hospitals hire therapists or technicians (or both). These hospitals do not meet the standards of the Joint. . .