Zusammenfassung der Ressource
1750-1900 Doctors and training
- At the start of the 18th Century and the industrial period, a doctor's
training continued to be mainly theoretical,
- But a small number of criminals' bodies were allowed to be used for dissection in medical schools and hospitals
- Qualifications
- Doctors could set up practices once they had been accepted
by the Royal College of Surgeons, the Royal College of
physicians or the Society of Apothecaries
- Medical training began to improve after 1815
- Where the Society of Apothecaries and the Royal College of Surgeons introduced
examinations before they awarded a certificate
- In 1858 - There was the General Medical Act
- This said that a General Medical Council had to be set up + all qualified doctors had to be registered
- However...
- The fact that doctors could still do relatively little
to treat disease - meant that they were not
always respected
- Practical experience
- After Pasteur's Germ Theory-
- There was more emphasis on using microscopes and understanding illness
- Practical experience was gained by observing doctors
as they worked in one of the teaching hospitals
- Important medical schools developed in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Oxford and London
- As medical knowledge advanced - doctors tended to divide into:
- General practitioners
- those who specialised in specific areas of the body or types of disease.
- These were usually called consultants
- Dissections
- Many medical students recognised the value of dissection and studying the human anatomy personally
- As a result - body snatchers operated in the 18th and early 19th centuries
- Seizing the bodies of hanged criminals / digging up newly buried corpses
- In order to provide specimens for students
- The government tried to end this practice (body snatching) -with the Anatomy Act of 1832
- This allowed licensed anatomists to take the corpse of anyone dying in the workhouse, who was not claimed by a relative
- John Hunter - a scientific approach
- His lectures on anatomy helped to develop a more professional approach to medical training
- He emphasised the importance of observation and experiment
- His students included Edward Jenner, who followed
Hunter's methods when investigating cowpox
- He employed a secretary to write up his notes + Paid an artist to draw his discoveries he made through dissection
- He published several important works, including one about the changes that occurred in pregnancy
- What affected the training of doctors?
- Improved technology
- e.g. thermometers
- Improved knowledge of disease
- e.g. Germ Theory
- Introduction of medical schools and teaching hospitals
- Improved communications
- e.g. medical texts, telegrams and phone
- Improved knowledge of anatomy and physiology
- e.g. through dissection