“FLIPPANT TOUCH”

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 100, 22 January 1936, Page 7

“FLIPPANT TOUCH”

Senate Reference To “Ladies of South” TRAINING DOCTORS By Telegraph—Press Association. Dunedin, January 21. That a fluctuation in the number of entering classes was a source of great inconvenience to medical schools all over the world and that the fluctuation here was independent of the internal conditions in the school and was the result of economic conditions- were the views expressed by Professor Sir 11. Lindo Ferguson, dean of the Medical School in Otago University, to-day in reply to criticism concerning the shortage of house surgeons. He also criticised the statement made by Mr. Kenneth Mackenzie before the University Senate in which the latter claimed there was a shortage of obstetrical and medical eases in Dunedin. “That a member of the committee of the senate whjjih came down twice to investigate conditions in the schoo. should speak somewhat loosely as to matters of fact in putting his views before the senate, which, as a lay body, may be expected to attach considerable weight to views expressed by its medical members, indicates a laca. of a sense of responsibility toward Lis profession and toward the public, inas much as the statements were calculated to create in the mind of the public a feeling of uneasiness as to the adequacy of the training of the younger members of the profession, said Sir Lindo. The suggestion that possibly the I ladies of the south had responded to the needs of the Medical School and the birth rate had gone up by 50 per cent, had a touch of flippancy about it which was hardly in keeping with the deliberation of the University Senate on a matter involving the health and welfare of the community. Referring to the statement by Mr. WWallace, chairman of the Auckland Hospital Board, that were not sufficient doctors passing through the Medical School to supply the needs of the Auckland Hospital for house surgeons, Sir Lindo said the annual demand of the hospitals of the Dominion for house surgeons ran to about 40, out the number varied from year to year owing to the fact that the number who stopped on for the second year s resident appointment depended on conditions which could not be foreseen. If the school was to supply a steady output of, say, 40 graduates a year, to fill the house surgeon vacancies it must have had an entering class of at least 40 six years previously. It took five years from the commencement of the medical studies before a student could qualify, and if only 20 students entered on the course in any particular year there could be only 20 graduates five years later. The fluctuation in the number of those entering the classes was a source of very great inconvenience to schools all over the world. In 1922 the entering class here was 94, in 1925 the number fell to 40, and in 1928 it had fallen to 26. The fall in the number, of entries came at a time when there was a period of fictitious prosperity, and when the slump came the pendulum swung rapidly the other way and the number of students began to go up. But a period of years during which there were lean entries made itself felt five years later in the output of graduates. Mr. Wallace seemed to think that matters could be remedied by the establishment of a second school, but if there were a dozen schools in New Zealand it would not affect the total-num-ber entering the profession, and if the classes were divided equally between here and Auckland it would not alter the fact that if only 20 studenfs were put in at the beginning of the curriculum only 20 surgeons could be got out five years later at the end of it, added Sir Lindo Ferguson.