Observations on the present state of medical education : with suggestions for its improvement / by James Syme.

  • Syme, James, 1799-1870.
Date:
1864
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Observations on the present state of medical education : with suggestions for its improvement / by James Syme. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    18/24 (page 18)
    With reference to one important point, which may indeed be regarded as its chief object, there can be no doubt that the existing Act was constructed through the influence of selfish considerations, and by completely ignoring the great principle of medical reform, that the privilege of practice should be equal to the extent of qualification, in the sense of education. The Act, it is true, would have established this long desired unifor¬ mity, but for the interpretation of six words introduced into the 31st clause, which reads thus :—“Every per¬ son registered under this Act shall be entitled, accord¬ ing to liis qualification or qualifications, to practise medicine or surgery, or medicine and surgery, in any part of her Majesty’s dominions.” Doubts were entertained as to what the words which I have placed in italics really meant. In all the discussions which had taken place before the Act was passed—during the thirty years’ war of medical reform—education and qualification were used as synonymous terms. But a majority of the Council decided that the amount of education was of no consequence in regard to the extent of privilege, and that the term “qualification” had refe¬ rence merely to the legal import of each title in¬ serted in the register. Hence, the degree of a Uni¬ versity, although requiring from its possessor the most ample study and examination in surgery, was held to give no authority except for the practice of physic. It necessarily followed from this reading of the act, that no medical man could be employed for the public service, whether in a civil or military