On surgical evidence in courts of law : with suggestions for its improvement / by John Eric Erichsen.

  • John Eric Erichsen
Date:
1878
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On surgical evidence in courts of law : with suggestions for its improvement / by John Eric Erichsen. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    legal authority, are said to know little of science should be the arbiters of cases for the proper comprehension of which a knowledge, and sometimes a profound knowledge, of medical science, and a very special acquaintance with some of its departments, is imperatively necessary. The lawyers do their best, and often with consummate skill and judgment, under serious disadvantages, for they have to strive against a system which is equally unjust to them and capricious in its operations on their clients. Of the causes of these conflicts of opinion I have else- where written at some length,1 and I need not enter upon that debatable ground here ; but from no inconsiderable experience in these matters, I can truly say that I believe that the frequency and the extent of these conflicts of scientific opinion have been greatly exaggerated ; that the present system adopted in courts of law tends to foster them, and that under a different system they would almost entirely, if not completely, be set at rest. So far as their frequency is concerned, I believe I speak very considerably within the mark when I say that in at least 90 per cent, of all cases of surgical injury in which claims for compensation are raised, there is perfect accord between the various medical men concerned as to the nature, the extent, and the probable duration of the injury. Such cases as these are necessarily settled out of court, and as they do not become the subject of judicial investigation, do not attract the attention of the public. In the small remainder of cases, certainly not amounting to one-tenth of the whole, a discrepancy of opinion will arise. This difference of opinion is not, as a rule, in respect to the facts of the case, but has rather reference to the possible pathology, the real extent of the injury, and probable 1 ‘ Concussion of the Spine, Nervous Shock, and Obscure Injuries of the Nervous System : ’ Lecture xiii., p. 3G0 et scq.
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