A sketch of the medical monopolies, with a plan of reform. Addressed to the Right Hon. Lord John Russell / [James Kennedy].

  • Kennedy, James, 1803-1868
Date:
1836
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A sketch of the medical monopolies, with a plan of reform. Addressed to the Right Hon. Lord John Russell / [James Kennedy]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    RECAPITULATION. as we]i as to the detriment of the profession, and in violation of the principle on which the medical corporations were origi¬ nally constituted. •/ The principle of their constitution is violated, inasmuch as these corporations do not at present form Examining Boards to stand between the public and incompetent practitioners in their respective departments. By the College of Physicians restricting its examinations to what is called pure physic,” the public have no warrant that the physicians who obtain its licence are fully qualified to practise physic; and by the College of Surgeons restricting its examination to “ pure surgery,” the public have no warrant that the surgeons who receive its diploma are fully qualified to practise surgery— for in practice these artificial distinctions cannot exist. What renders the defective state of the examinations at these Col¬ leges the more glaring is, that they will punish by exclu¬ sion from all corporate offices and degradation of rank any of their members that may go before a second board to remedy the omissions of the first—provided the additional testimonial is turned to any practical account. Out of this branch system, the multiplication of Examining Boards has arisen, which is of itself an evil of some magnitude, as it tends to destroy the unity of medical science, and to harass and produce dissensions among its members. For this reason the Board of Pharmacy should never have been established, and even the creation of a Board of Surgery was injudicious. Moreover, to guard against the defects in the examinations of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, it has been consi¬ dered necessary to constitute an examining board in the Army, and another in the Navy, which, if it be not disgraceful to the medical corporations, is, at least, galling to those individuals who are obliged to undergo examinations before several boards, when one might be made more efficient than the whole. As an instance of the impropriety of having the medical cor¬ porations acting on inefficient and discordant principles, it may be mentioned that an army order was issued in July, 1830, which excludes from his Majesty’s military service all pure physicians: and by the army regulations surgeons are required to stand an examination in physic before the army medical