Letter to the chairman of the Joint Committee of Medical and Surgical professors, &c.

Date:
[1839?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Letter to the chairman of the Joint Committee of Medical and Surgical professors, &c. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    / took place in the joint Committee, it was proposed to do away the compulsory repetition of any course what- ever, a proposal to which I then did, and still do, ex- press myself most favourably inclined; but, in conse- quence of some difference of opinion on this point, and the improbability of our being able to carry other bodies along with us in this view of the matter, it was finally resolved, that in three departments, Anatomy, Practice of Physic, and Surgery, two or more courses should be enjoined. The option previously given to the student of Surgery by the Edinburgh College, was then, very properly, extended to the student of Physic, and in both cases enlarged. In looking to the working of the regulation of the College of Surgeons above alluded to, I have been in- duced to examine the schedules of education presented to me during the two years that I was President of the College, from October 1836 to October 1838, and I find that of 340 candidates for diplomas, 52 had attended the class of Military Surgery; of this number three, from having commenced their education previous to 1829, were not required to take more than one course of Surgery; of the remainder, twenty had taken the Mili- tary Surgery, in addition to two or more courses of the Principles and Practice of Surgery; leaving twenty-nine, or about fourteen annually, who had taken the Military Surgery as part of the requisite qualification for exami- nation at the Edinburgh College, or at the Army Medi- cal Board. This statement, while it shews that the course of Military Surgery has been taken by the students for other purposes than as a passport to examination at Surgeons’ Hall, shews also, that the regulation of the College has not that important bearing on the inter-