The future training of the medical profession : an inaugural address, delivered at St. George's Hospital, on October 1, 1888 / by William Ewart.

  • William Ewart
Date:
1888
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The future training of the medical profession : an inaugural address, delivered at St. George's Hospital, on October 1, 1888 / by William Ewart. 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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    urgency. They are respectively concerned with the Science and with the Practice of oui- profession within a fast approaching future :— In what manner is the medical mind to deal with the enormous increase of knowable facts ? How, on the other hand, are medical practitioners to sm-vive if their numbers maintain their present rate of expansion ? The answer to both these problems appears to me to be intimately connected with medical education (an old and well-worn subject, but one of evei-changing complexion), and I therefore propose to submit to you certain views on the Training of the Medical Man. A moment ago I was complimenting our students that they had joined a School which, in no sense, could be called overcrowded. The same may no longer be said of our profession. Its previously serene regions are fast becoming another scene for the struggle for existence. Year by year the increasing popularity of medicine as a calling is becoming a more onerous compliment to receive. Of worldly advantages it is little enough that professional men have to lose, excepting their position and their dignity. The danger to which the latter are exposed has become sufficiently manifest when, as a result of excessive mutual pressure, the actual means of sustenance is being curtailed for some. Moreover, among the thousands admitted thi'ough portals at times too widely opened, there have entered a few whose aims were mx- worthy. To them it was matter for small concern if the fair name of professional fellowship, if the sacredness of nights acquired by long and honoured service, if the dignity of a great profession suffei'ed diminution, so long as they could realise, at the cost of their own debasement, their idea of success. This is not the place to describe the arts by which the legitimate field of worthier and