Doctor and Patient - Doctors and Patients, Lost in Paperwork - NYTimes.com

Part of the societal evolution affecting printed newspapers are the changing balances for so many people between what they read and what they write. Historically, apart from education, much of what most people did was to read, in part because writing always required so much more of an effort - the pen that needed to refilled, the pager that needed to be had, the mistakes that needed to be corrected, etc. That eveolved with technology as writing instruments got better, easier and cheper. It also evolved as machines have made it easier to write from typewriters to computer and handheld devices.

So, too, professional work has evolved in a similar but not exactly parallel fashion.

Printed newspapers, however, have taken little of this into account except in pre-press, as newspapers call it, and general conputeriszaiton.

How, in the case of this linked story, does a newspaper become the best friend of the young doctor suffering udner the weight of kestroking deands. If newspapers cannot see a way to help, they ought not be in their business.