THE MORPHIA VICTIM AND THE DOCTOR.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIII, Issue 92, 19 April 1902, Page 5 (Supplement)

THE MORPHIA VICTIM AND THE DOCTOR.

A PECULIAR. ACTION.

In the relations of medical men with their lady patients, especially where the latter are hysterically or nervously inclined, there is necessity (or extreme caution. Grave charges are sometimes brought against doctors by women patients based only on the latter's morbid imagination. Such charges are difficult to disprove, and the cost of clearing himself of such an imputation may be ruinous to a. doctor at the outset of

his career. Even the mere association of scandal with a doctor's name, however unjustifiable, may have a prejudicial effect upon his clientele. The rule therefore adopted by some medical men of insisting that a nurse or some third person shall be present at interviews with a lady patient is a sound one.

Had Dr. Law kept Miss Charlotte Fotsythe always at arm's length in this way, he would not have had to spend four days in court defending the action which she brought against him some weeks ago in London, for damages for the administration to her of excessive quantities of morphia, and which the jury stopped after they had heard the doctor's evidence. Dr. Law had attended Miss Forsythe for years, and in consequence of their long standing friendship had never charged her a penny. Kis benevolence has been rewarded by the basest charges against him, and by an action which both judge and jury indignantly declared should never have been brought, and the costs of which, owins to the plaintiff's circumstances, he wil probably have to bear himself.

Miss Forsythe is a maternity nurse of 43, who was introduced to Dr. Law In 1888, and afterwards nursed for him. she and her family becoming friends of his. In 1894 she consulted him about her own condition, and soon afterwards opened a nursing home at Bulstrode-st. with a Miss Ward. Although Dr. Law, on going to Ripley about this time, retained only a consulting practice, he from time to time prescribed for Miss Forsythe and her partner without charge when they required medical aid.

From 1595 onwards Miss Forsythe suffered from severe attacks of spasmodic asthma, and after trying- various forms of treatment without success Dr. Law had recourse to hypodermic injections of morphia, a remedy which, as Sir Douglas Powell told the jury, is a proper one and absolutely essential in severe cases to relieve the patient. Dr. Law instructed both Miss Forsythe and her partner, who were trained nurses, in the use of the hypodermic syringe and the quantity to be injected. It was not quite clear whether Miss Forsythe prior to this had taken morphia or not. There seemed reason to suppose that she had. At all events, before long she acquired the morphia habit, and administered morphia to herself surreptitiously. This Dr. Law did not find out until 1599. In the meantime her condition deteriorated, specialists were consulted, and their treatment followed. Dr. Law continued to attend her purely for friendship's, sake,and did what he could to relieve her pain and improve her health. When he discovered that she had the morphia habit he endeavoured to break her of it gradually, the general opinion being- that sudden abandonment of morphia is attended with great danger. He diluted the morphia 'with water to 1 in 20, the prescription still showing- a strength of 1 in 10 to Miss Forsythe. When he found that the chloral which he had prescribed for sleeplessness and had left in Miss Ward's charge had been taken during the day by Miss Forsythe, he prescribed a mixture with an entire absence of chloral and seized bottles containing strychnine, cnloroform, and atropine, and threw them into the street..

Eventually Miss Forsythe became irresponsible for her actions. A new nurse, Critchlow, who was employed came to the conclusion that too much morphia was being1 taken and that Miss ForsythS*s life was in peril. She communicated with the family, Who called in Dr. Kirkland. This doctor adopted the heroic but decidedly dangerous course of suddenly stopping the morphia altogether. Miss Forsythe had a collapse, and was on the threshold of death, but eventually recovered and once more 'resumed charge of a nursing home, heart trouble being her only present ailment. This heart trouble was assigned as the reason for her nonappearance in court and the taking of her evidence on commission. It was suggested by Miss. Forsythe's family that Dr. Law had declared that she was bound to die and that morphia was the easiest way. The jury found these stories as incredible as they appeared to the newspaper reader, and after Dr. Law's straightforward account of his treatment, found for the defendant, intimating that the action should never have been brought. Mr Justice Grantham expressed his "indignation at the conduce of those who instructed counsel. They brought a distinct charge against this doctor — a charge of the basest kind. It was that the defendant had deliberately got ijp a mock consultation with another doctor. There is not the slightest justification for this. I like to see people fight, and fight hard and upon facts, but not un-

fairly."

The action seems somewhat akin to Uiose cases in which an attempt is maQe to extort money under colour of the law on the assumption that the knowledge of the plaintiff's straitened circumstances and of the fact that the defendant, even if successful, will have no prospect of recovering his costs from the plaintiff, may induce the defendant to pay up in order to save worry and expense. The mystery to the man in the street is how such a case as Miss Forsythe's not only comes to trial, but is strenuously put forward by so' keen and eminent a counsel as Sir Edward Clarke, when apparently a little preliminary cross-examination of tEe plaintiff's witnesses would have knocked the bottom out of it.