Harold Pollack, a health policy researcher at the University of Chicago, thinks he may be seeing the makings of a medical miracle: doctors embracing reform.

Blogging at Jonathan Cohn's the Treatment, Pollock quickly reviews why physicians have long blocked reform (at one point, years ago, he says, the AMA even opposed immunization clinics as a camel's nose under the tent of socialized medicine) and why "increasing numbers of physicians have come to favor fundamental healthcare financing and delivery reform." That includes a growing number of doctors who favor a single-payer system, as well as those who want significant changes in the current hybrid system that just isn't meeting the needs of patients. Or for the people who take care of them. He writes:

Physician opinion is rapidly changing. One could say much more, but the basic reasons are clear from 50,000 feet. Doctors witness firsthand the cruelties and idiocies imposed by our fragmented system.

Managed care organizations already impose the mindless paperwork and micromanagement physicians once feared would accompany a larger public role. Moreover, our healthcare system fails to honor basic values that physicians hold dear. Every day, general practitioners try in vein to find specialists for the Medicaid patient whose cancer diagnosis was delayed because she avoided preventive care. Oncologists watch that same patient struggle with five- and six-figure medical bills as she confronts a frightening illness. Urban providers witness overcrowded emergency rooms and a crumbling safety-net increasingly unable to provide patients with compassionate care or to provide healthcare professionals with a stable, attractive, and worthy environment to perform their work.

Pollock recognizes there will be a lot of "pushing and shoving" including between specialists and primary care doctors. But he's optimistic. "Our existing, increasingly dysfunctional healthcare system doesn't just work poorly for patients. It works poorly for doctors and for many others, too. That's one reason I am hopeful we will see a major reform, this year."

The National Journal Health Experts blog is looking at how health reform may "squeeze" doctors. The first response came from the AMA's president, Nancy Neilsen, who was once uninsured herself.