Welsh Journals

The National The article in our first number on Medical the Education of the Welsh Doctor School. has been much discussed in Uni- versity and medical circles and is likely to lead to important results. Rumours are afloat that generous donors are forthcoming prepared to complete the erection and equipment of the buildings necessary for the proposed Medical School, and measures are far advanced for obtaining an adequate maintenance grant. If the suggestions we outlined last month are carried out then five years from to-day Wales will possess not the biggest but the best Medical School in the United Kingdom. For it will be permeated with the Spirit of Research and with the belief that an ounce of Prevention is worth a pound of Cure. Those who are loudly clamouring Jor more Dreadnoughts must not be allowed to drown the stiller smaller voices of those who would seek the Chancellor's help to discover the ways of public health and industrial safety. Nowhere is our tangled civilization more grimly contrasted than in the noisy yards of the navy builders restlessly fashioning the deadliest engines of destruction and in the silent laboratory of the scientist seeking how to deliver man from the prey of the parasite, the one darkening the world with hate and death, the other lighting it with life and health. The Researchers' Hymn, written by Sir Ronald Ross on the eve of his great discovery, comes inevit- ably to mind: This day relenting God Hath placed within my hand A wondrous thing and God Be praised. At His command Seeking His secret deeds, With tears and toiling breath, I find thy cunning seeds, 0 million-murdering Death. I know this little thing A myriad men will save. 0 Death, where is thy sting ? Thy victory, 0 Crave ? The Supply The quantity and quality of doctors of Doctors. in a country ought obviously to bear some direct relation to the health or disease of that country. The better the doctors the fewer of them should be required, and the ideal supply curve is one steadily falling to zero. Unfortunately there are so many arrears of past neglect to overtake, so many patients likely to lead irrational lives, and so many secrets still to be wrung from Nature, that the demand for, and therefore the supply of, doctors is certain to continue for an indefinite time, and the founders of the Medical School need have no qualms. It is true that when the Insurance Bill was before Parliament we were told that the profession was on the edge of ruin and that we should soon see the last student of medicine leave the Schools. An examination of the Register of the General Medical Council proves that for nearly 20 years there has been a steady decline in the annual additions to the Register. The Insurance Act only accentuated a movement already in progress and that only temporarily. We do not remember having seen the following figures assembled before. Percentage of additions Total No. No. Added to total No. Year. on Register. to Register. in each year. 1891 29555 1345 4.6 1892 30590 1513 4.9 1901 36912 1318 3.6 1902 37232 1275 3.4 1910 40483 1062 2.6 1911 40913 1042 2.5 1912 41439 1157 2.8 The percentage addition for each quinquennium percentage was as follows :­ 1893-1897 42 1898-1902 3.6 1903-1907 3.1 1908-1912 2.7 The decline may be due to a combination of causes the growth of a health intelligence, the increase in the number of nurses and similar agencies, and the competition of other professional careers. Whatever the explanation two points are of para- mount importance to the public firstly, the effective distribution of the forty thousand doctors throughout the population and the consequent avoidance of the waste due to the over-doctoring of some areas and the neglect of others; and secondly, the opening of the profession to all the talents. Attempts to limit artificially the supply of candidates, to restrict the field of supply to the middle classes, and to share the spoils within a close corporation must be opposed and the highway made plain to the workman s son to enter the most honourable profession.