title: The sitting statue of Vargas.
abstract: Medicine and health care in Venezuela have had a roller coaster evolution in parallel with advances and retreats of democracy and of efforts to modernize. The most prominent of the founding fathers of Venezuelan medicine has a sitting statue in the homonymous hospital. After a blossoming of medicine, health care, and research led by dermatology that lasted for nearly four decades, the system went into a tailspin that mirrors what took place in the governmental institutions and in the economy. The statue of Vargas seems to warn Venezuelans that if the decay goes too far, it may become irreversible.
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology and Immunology, Vargas School of Medicine, Central University of Venezuela, Caracas, Venezuela. mgoihmanyahr@yahoo.com
authors.forename: Mauricio
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Goihman-Yahr
mesh_terms: D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000266:history*; D003880:Dermatology / Q000266:history*; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D049674:History, 21st Century; D006801:Humans; D014687:Venezuela