Physician Status

In our culture the first people that come to mind in times of physical distress are doctors.  We rely on them to save our lives in terms of immediate care or following our long term health needs.  In the past before the discovery of antibiotics and the subsequent knowledge of how to administer those drugs, a simple infection could be fatal.  As technology improved and the medical field continued to evolve, the possibilities of survival improved substantially.  These days we expect that doctors can fix almost any physical ailment or disease presented to them, and for the most part, our technology today allows them to treat a plethora of illnesses.  Since doctors have this relatively new power to extend life or alleviate symptoms they have taken on an almost god like reverence.  The average patient won't stop to think about the years of research or the thousands of other people who contributed to the current state of the medical field, rather they will purely see that their doctor has cured them.  For this reason, amongst the other valid points previously mentioned, I believe doctors are held in such high regards.