Capsules

P: A "record ratio" of one doctor for every 730 inhabitants of the U.S. was claimed by the A.M.A. as a bumper crop of 6,861 medical-school graduates raised the total of physicians to 220,100. But fewer than half of these were in private general practice, and the number of patients for each full-time G.P. is 1,968--virtually unchanged since 1950.

P: Lung cancer, usually rated as hard to diagnose until it is far advanced, may be detectable in its earliest stages, suggested Radiologist Leo G. Rigler of the University of Minnesota. Rereading of chest X rays taken as long as nine years before the patients were found to have lung cancer revealed abnormal shadows and marks.Dr. Rigler believes that these were danger signals, not recognized in time.

P: Baltimore's Tower Club, for tall men (6 ft. 2 in. or more) and women (5 ft. 10 in. and up), donated two beds, 7 ft. 7 in. long, to Union Memorial Hospital. The club's organizer. Jerry Geller, had suffered from having his 7 ft. 2 in. frame folded into a standard 6 ft. 6 in. bed.

Findings reported to the American Physiological Society, meeting at Madison, Wis.:

P: Thin men fight off cold by shivering, while their chubby brothers relax behind insulating layers of fat, said two Army researchers, Dr. Farrington Daniels Jr. and Paul Baker. Volunteer subjects, wearing nothing but shorts, sat in a 60DEG room for two hours. The fat men kept their internal body temperatures normal, although their skin temperatures dropped. The thin men maintained higher skin readings, partly by drawing on the body's internal heat supply, partly by shivering more. The shivering was accompanied by increased oxygen consumption, as the thin men burned more food to keep warm.

P: Brain surgery can now be performed with greater precision, using ultrasonic vibrations (a million cycles per second, or 50 times faster than the highest audible note) instead of the neurosurgeon's knife. University of Illinois researchers have focused the beam down to one-twentieth of an inch in diameter--the thickness of a pencil lead.

P: Except in the first days of hot weather, most people get enough salt in normally seasoned food, reported Indiana University's Professor Sid Robinson. After that, only those doing hard labor in extreme heat should take extra salt. For others, it puts too heavy a burden on the kidneys and sweat glands.

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