Monthly retrospect of the medical sciences : January to December 1849 / edited by George E. Day, Alexander Fleming, W.T. Gairdner.

Date:
MDCCCXLIX [1849]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Monthly retrospect of the medical sciences : January to December 1849 / edited by George E. Day, Alexander Fleming, W.T. Gairdner. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    you should decline taking charge of the case till he has communicated with his parents or guardian, and obtained their sanction for your attendance. Before undertaking the case, however, you should endeavour to reconcile the patient to his ordinary attendant, by removing any pre¬ judice or misconception he may be labour¬ ing under ; although, when the objection is simply a decided want of confidence, no arguments that you can use will probably be of much avail. Query 14.—Is a medical man to con¬ sider himself bound in honour to conceal from the demands of justice, information that has come to his knowledge through the necessary and unavoidable divulge- ments of professional intercourse, when such testimony might prove detrimental to his patient ? Arts.—He is bound by law to forward the ends of justice, and as an honest man and a good citizen he cannot and will not try to do otherwise. However, he should use his own discretion in cautioning his patient and the friends against imparting or exposing anything that could be turned to the party’s disadvantage, and he should show no inquisitiveness beyond what is absolutely necessary towards the proper discharge of his professional duties. The Roman Catholic priest enjoys in this re¬ spect, by the established law of custom, I suppose, an advantage over the medical man ; and very properly, for otherwise one of the most important rites of that religion would be rendered perfectly nu¬ gatory. [This answer is not satisfactory. If a medical practitioner, when called in to any case, makes the discovery that his patient has committed some crime—no matter what—or is in hiding from the officers of justice, we consider that he is bound to keep the discovery as profound¬ ly secret, as is the Catholic priest who has received the same information at the con¬ fessional ; had he not been a physician he would never have made the discovery; as a physician, he is hound to keep it secret, and to avoid turning it in any way to his advantage, whether as a means of extort¬ ing a large fee or otherwise. Having completed the cure, he must leave his pa¬ tient in the same condition, as regards his relations with the world at large, as when he found him ; his last words must not be, “ Call the police 1 ” but “ Go, and sin no more.”] Query 15.—Is it proper in a medical man to attend his own wife in her con¬ finement? Ans.—Perfectly proper, provided he is accustomed to this branch of the profes¬ sion, and she and her friends have con¬ fidence in him : but if there he anything unnatural and difficult in the case, he should at once take assistance ; or, if his feelings interfere with the proper treat¬ ment of it, he should leave it entirely in the hands of another. Such a course will, in the event of a fatal termination, pre¬ vent malicious remarks, or even judicial interference, and save the practitioner and the friends from subsequent regrets. Query 16.—When sent for, in an em¬ ergency, to a midwifery case, in the ab¬ sence of the practitioner whose attend¬ ance had been pre-engaged ; and suppos¬ ing him at last to arrive when the case is occupying your most serious attention, or even receiving your manual or mechanical interference—what is the proper etiquette to be followed ? Ans.—To resign the case at once into his hands—or, at all events, as soon as safely practicable, after explaining the state of matters to him, and obtaining, or taking for granted, the patient’s consent to the transference. If your further as¬ sistance is wished by the practitioner who was pre-engaged, or by the patient with his consent, which it would probably be if the case were one of difficulty or danger, then you ought to remain. As to the remuneration, the answer would be as in query 9. Query 17.—Do the prescriptions of a medical man belong to the patient or to the prescriber ? Ans.—The prescriptions written by a medical man are the property of his pa¬ tients ; and I do not think that the former is justified, under any circumstances, in taking away or destroying them. If he should do so, patients will be apt to suspect some sinister motive,—most pro¬ bably a wish to conceal his malpraxis, or else to deprive them of the means of treating themselves in any subsequent similar attack. Query 18.—In the case of an accident, involving responsibility on the part of any one, whether has the sufferer, or the per¬ son whose responsibility is compromised, the right to appoint the medical attend¬ ant ? Ans.—The patient himself or his friends, I think, have the prior right (whether they choose to exercise it in the first in¬ stance or not), as no consideration can be held to outweigh a man’s interest in his own life and health ; but the other like¬ wise has a right to satisfy himself as to the competency of the attendance and skill which are bestowed on the case ; and, whether he has any doubts on these points or not, may, for his own satisfaction, as-