Role of Women in Medicine

Nursing and Hospitals
1. Before 1850
  1. Hospitals couldn't be afforded by the poor
  2. Often very dirty
  3. Most nurses were untrained
  4. Nursing considered an unacceptable profession
  5. Part of wages paid in gin
2. Florence Nightingale
  1. From a rich background
    1. Parents were unhappy with decision to be a nurse because it wasn't considered a respectable profession
  2. Trained for 3 months in Germany
  3. Came back to UK and ran hospital for rich women but wasn't happy
  4. Crimean War (1854-56)
    1. 100,000 British soldiers killed/injured but many more fell ill through typhus and other diseases
    2. Florence was asked to take control of nursing in Scutari
    3. Took 38 nurses with her
    4. Horrified at conditions
      1. No toilets
      2. No cleaning basins, soaps, mops, towels or cleaning materials
    5. Wrote to government describing conditions and requesting what she needed (i.e. cleaning materials)
    6. Hired 200 builders to rebuild part of a ward
    7. Some doctors objected to being ordered around by a nurse but Florence persevered
    8. Reduced death rate from 40% to 2%
  5. Back in Britain
    1. Heralded as 'Lady with the Lamp'
      1. National hero
    2. Wrote a book called 'Notes on Nursing' to tell the government how to improve things
    3. Raised £44,000 to set up Britain's first nurse training school
    4. Also published 'Notes on Hospitals' which introduced new ideas about hospital design
      1. Well-ventilated, open, spacious
      2. Mistaken idea about miasma but right concept
  6. Controversy
    1. She refused to believe in the Germ Theory and taught her nurses about miasma
    2. She may not have actually improved conditions in Scutari
      1. However she began to change the image of nursing
      2. She had the right idea about hospital improvements
Doctors
1. Sophia Jex-Blake
  1. Life
    1. Born to physician father with traditional views on women's education
    2. Convinced to allow to go to university to become a maths tutor
    3. 1869 - convinced Edinburgh University to allow her to learn to be a doctor
    4. However they said that they couldn't provide a woman with a degree
  2. Achievements
    1. Took the university to court and lost
    2. Took her case to parliament and in 1875, a law was passed that meant women could not be restricted from gaining medical qualifications on grounds of gender
      1. Despite this, she qualified as a doctor in Ireland after gaining her degree in Switzerland
    3. In 1874, she co-founded the London School of 'Medicine for Women'
      1. Elizabeth Garret Anderson was also a co-founder
  3. Limitations on her success
    1. Father with traditional views
    2. Sexism and attitude toward women
    3. Men objecting to her presence at the university
2. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson
  1. Couldn't get on any courses at university
  2. Some men agreed to tutor her privately and she passed the Apothecaries exam in 1865
    1. She was refused a license but won a court appeal and was given one
    2. However, they refused to pass any other students who studied privately
  3. 1869 - qualified abroad in Paris and achieved top grades
  4. Got on the Medical Register on return to Britain
  5. Showed how and inspired people to do the same
    1. Elizabeth Hoggon (1870)
    2. Elizabeth Walker (1872)
  6. Continued limitations
    1. Woman and would not have been very well respected
    2. Very long, arduous process
    3. Women still couldn't go to university in Britain
  7. 1874 - co-founded London School of Medicine for Women
3. Attitudes in the 1850s
  1. People didn't think that women had the ability
  2. 1858 - General Medical Act, everyone had to put their names on General Medical Register in order to practise
    1. Only one woman, Elizabeth Blackwell, in 1858
      1. Qualified in USA
  3. English universities wouldn't accept them so they couldn't qualify
World Wars
1. Some women had to take the places of male doctors
2. More wounded and so more medical staff needed

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Role of Women in Medicine

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	Created by Niamh MacElvogue almost 10 years ago

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