On provident dispensaries as a means for promoting the public health / by James Christie.

  • Christie, James, 1829-1892.
Date:
[1880?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On provident dispensaries as a means for promoting the public health / by James Christie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    PkUo$opkicat Society < ^' fHnggow. wait an hour or two, and which, most liktly, they never took. I liiiUir became aecvjisiarily u pious, or mther a cliaritaUlt*. fraud—u fraud on both contributors aiid {uitients, medical officers and students. While the leading medical men of London, and specially those who^ nameB are familiar to us in connection with tlu* hosjiitals, < • e moving in tlie matter of hospital reform, the Charily • ! ^ . having for its object tlie improvement of the ^.'•i. >- .. 1... .. uf the jKX)r, came to the conclusion that one of u. -t {Hjwt-i-ful <.»f the causes by which their condition had been d* j.i. . ..il •v. vm this Kyst4.'m of gratuitous, indiscriminate medical relief; and that every other arrangement for their l>enefit must fail in pnxlucing its full effect while this evil remained unniucdictl. The Council of the Society, therefore, apipointed a committ^^ to iuvcKtigate the matter, and, in ()cto)K>r, 1871, this committee made a re|>ort, ]>ointing to '* a large development of the provident principle as the apjiropnate remeily for the abuses of tl»e metlical charities ; and submitting mcnlel rules for the manag<- mcnt of Provident Disjxjusaries, liasod ujton the exi»ericnce of thus<' institutions. Tl <'' trittj Orgnuiz/Uion A'ociVfy have held threes conferences on the . . J i : one in 1871, which was atUaided by Mr. W, H. .Smith, M.P., and by Mr. Stansfeld. M.P.; the stHXind under the presidency of Dr. Adand, the president of the General Medical Council; and the third imder LonI Frederick Cavendish. In 1875 a large and influentiid section of the medical profession, resident chiefly in London, moved in regard to the quej^tion of iiospital and free dispensary abuse as inflicting a serious injury \\\)o\x many deseoing members of the medical profession; and a petition was prescnteil to the jjresident and committee of council of the Briti.sh Medical Association, to take into consideration the relation of the metlical profession tf» the hospitals and free dis- pensaries throughout the kingdom. When called upon by the com- mittee to devi.se some measure of reform, it was proposed, inter afin, that at all hospitals and free dispensaries there should be some system whereby on effectual inquiry might Ixj made into the social condition of the applicants for medical cliarity, and their ability or non-ability to pay something for themselves; and that, in the development of the Provident System, and the various modifications of which it is susceptible, a remedy might perhaps be found for the evols which have l^ecome apparent.