Rep. Parker Griffith, MD, doesn't strike you as the kind of man who fixates on titles. The former radiation oncologist and recently installed congressman claims he'll answer to most anything. His primary concern these days is answering to his constituents in Alabama's 5th District. "Somebody who has known me as a doctor [often asks], 'What shall I call you?'", he says, his voice a lightly honeyed drawl. "It's nice to be called a congressman...but 'doctor' is fine, as well--or 'Hey, you.'"

The first radiation oncologist sworn into Congress, the 66-year-old Democrat certainly finds himself with much to answer for--an unfair burden, perhaps, since he played no role in shaping the policies that may have contributed to the nation's ailing economy. Last year at this time, Dr. Griffith was just 18 months into his first term of elected office, serving as freshman state senator of Alabama's 7th District. Having played behind-the-scenes roles in several political campaigns since retiring from medicine in 1992, the Huntsville businessman and married father of five--who owns everything from radio stations and tire recycling centers to nursing homes and funeral parlors--first ran for public office in 2004. He narrowly lost that bid for Huntsville mayor, but the experience calcified his interest in politics as a means to effect systemic change in American health care. "I've always been around what I considered [to be] good, honest politicians. That may sound like an oxymoron, but in my particular experience, it was not," he says. "I began to realize that good public policy as far as health care is concerned can save more lives than all the chemotherapy and radiation therapy in the world. It's imperative that we in America--particularly our physicians--take some responsibility for the fact that access to health care is limited. And in many rural counties and inner-city areas, it's not just limited--there's no access at all. It's all crisis medicine delivered through an emergency room."

Not surprisingly, health care became a key plank of his campaign platform last year when his friend Robert "Bud" Cramer Jr., a nine-term House Democrat, announced his retirement and tapped Dr. Griffith to run for his seat. But with the economy topping the national agenda, he recognizes that health care reform may not be addressed to his satisfaction anytime soon--despite President Obama's pledge to the contrary. It's just one hard lesson he's learned since arriving on Capitol Hill in January. "I had no idea that it would be this intense, with this many meetings and this many people to see," says Dr. Griffith. "And...we're transitioning [during] the worst financial crisis since the Depression; that adds to the intensity."

His at-a-glance health care stance: He's a proponent of universal access to care (if a tad nebulous on specifics) and an ardent foe of Big Tobacco--a position that once would have seemed counterintuitive if not downright unfathomable for a Southern legislator. He's also troubled by America's eroding supply of primary care physicians--and encouraged by the fact that he joins 15 other physicians in the 111th Congress. "More and more physicians realize that the political process is going to affect them in a great way--both financially and as far as quality of care is concerned--if [they] don't participate in finding the answers," he says. "We've got a problem that we've got to fix, and only America can fix it. We're not going to fix it with an English system, a Canadian system [or] someone else's system--it's got to be uniquely American. We need the medical profession to weigh in on it...and not come at it as [if] being attacked."