Environmental issues continue to occupy a good portion of the news and editorial thinking of contemporary society. No matter what we do, we are asked to think about the environmental impact of our actions. As we build, raze, and change the world around us, we worry about destruction of habitats, conservation of resources, and endangerment of species—and rightly so. In acknowledging the importance of that theme, I would like to discuss some of the factors that currently affect a different kind of environment—the one in which we work—which is facing real pressures from our current economic and political climate. Instead of the rain forest, I am alluding to our own ecosystem, the rather delicately balanced world of academic medicine, and to academic orthopaedics in particular. I think the environmental analogy is reasonable. People already talk routinely about the health-care environment, the managed-care environment, and the medicolegal climate. Also, our academic world does resemble a rather complex and fragile ecosystem, with many interdependent parts and members. It is a system that has thrived for generations because of a favorable climate, and it has been able to support a diverse and vigorous “animal kingdom.” But times have changed. Extrinsic forces have developed that have stressed and challenged the health of our system and have begun to threaten the survival of some of our more exotic and valuable “species.” Hurwitz and Buckwalter, in a recent editorial in the Journal of Orthopaedic Research, concisely and eloquently documented the decline and potential extinction of one of the most important members of our community—the orthopaedic scientist1. Any attempt made by me to paraphrase that position would serve no purpose; the case for concern was made clearly and convincingly. Instead, I would like to present my own candidate for our growing “endangered species” list—the orthopaedic …