EMPLOYMENT OF DOCTORS

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27442, 31 August 1954, Page 3

EMPLOYMENT OF DOCTORS

Warning By Medical Journal (Special Correspondent N.Z.P.A.) LONDON, August 29. The British Medical Association is concerned over the employment prospects of newly qualified doctors in Britain, says the current “British Medical Journal.” It says that jhis autumn about 2500 students will enter medical schools, and that it is doubtful whether all of them will be able to get a living from the practice of medicine, even allowing for wastage. It adds that that number of graduates seems likely to increase for some years unless artificially checked. “From 1939 to 1952, when there were 83,000 names on the Medical Register, there was an increase of 33 per cent., which meant there was one doctor to every 900 of the population,” says the journal “If, however, the present trends continue, students beginning this year will find that by the time they have qualified, there will be one doctor to about 800 of the population. “If the intake of students is kept at the same rate as it has been for some years, a surplus of medical graduates can be expected in 1960. “Students now embarking on a medical career should be advised that they may well face stiffer competition in future than their predecessors, and that the existence of the National Health Service is no guarantee of future employment.” Quality of Students Anxiety on another aspect of medical education—the quality of medical students-r-is voiced in the same journal by the former Dean of a London teaching hospital. He says that during the last two years the quality of the applicants for admission to medical schools. is “manifestly declining” in both academic standing and in the personal traits required for the medical profession. “This is attributed to several factors, including the sense of security introduced by the National Health Service, and the fact that to be a medical student is one of the few ways left for a boy to postpone his period of national service and to entel the armed forces directly as a comipissioned officer/’