DOCTORS MEET

Evening Star, Issue 25716, 13 February 1946, Page 9

DOCTORS MEET

FIRST B.M.A. CONFERENCE SINCE WAR STARTED A NEW POOL OF KNOWLEDGE (P.A.) AUCKLAND, February 12. The first annual conference of the New Zealand branch of the B.M.A. since 1939, was officially opened i« Auckland by the Governor-General this morning, about 200 doctors from all parts of the Dominion attending. His Excellency paid a tribute to the work of the New Zealand medical services in the war. He considered they had performed a magnificent task, as he had seen for himself in the Pacific. He said he was looking forward to the Utopian era when, a greater proportion of the medical profession would be devoted to the task of maintaining health rather than curing sickness.

Sir Stanton Hicks, professor of physiology and pharmacology at the Adelaide University, later in the conference emphasised the importance of maintaining a continuous cycle of 'matter from the soil through the body and back to the soil, and advocated an extensive educational campaign to hring the importance of this cycle before the people. The recent knighthood conferred on Major-general Sir Frederick Bowerbank had been a tribute to the whole of the medical profession in New Zealand, said the Governor-General, Sir Ovril. Newall. His Excellency paid a tribute to the service rendered to the men in the forces by the medical men from New Zealand during the war. Their service had been magnificent, he said, and had won the admiration" of all countries. The nursing services were included in this tribute. Details of the service of medical men with the armed forces were (placed on record by Brigadier H. S. Kenrick in a brief address following the official opening. From 1939 until last year, he said, 650 New Zealand medical men had served with the three armed set--

vices. Of these, 525 had given service overseas, -which in turn threw a great burden on those who remained in New Zealand. Fifteen had been killed or had died on service. 13 had been wounded, and 31 became prisoners of war. • The roll of honour was read, and members stood in silence in respect to the memory of those who had died. PREVENTION THE NEW FOCUS. /The greater knowledge that the war had given medical science was the subject of an address given by Dr A. Eisdell Moore, _ after he had been inducted as president of the New Zealand branch of the B.M.A. When demobilisation was complete the community would benefit by the individual experiences of the returning doctors, he said. Unlike the combatants, these men had had their professional knowledge extended in many directions, and that increased pool of knowledge was available to the public of this country. " I am struck by the amount of work that has been more of a preventive nature than of a curative nature." remarked Dr Moore. "In wounds, the prevention of shock, infection, and complications; in the air, the prevention of danger from lowered pressures and from lack of oxygen; and in the Navy, the prevention of tuberculosis contagion. Prevention should be the focus of our outlook on the new world. When we, as surgeons, thoughtfully consider our work, we must recognise that many established surgical procedures are really very crude ways of tackling disease.

CANCER RESEARCH. " It is possible that in a generation from now the cause or causes of cancer will be known, and that perhaps by_ the correction of some circulating poison or some dietetic error cancer will be preventable," added the speaker. "We will rejoice when the knife can be laid aside in the treatment of this disease." Penicillin and sulfa drugs came into practical use during the war, and one had only to consider what would have um?i re . asonable prognoses in Mr Churchill s illnesses to recognise the value of these drugs. Penicillin was now available for civilian use, and every day in this country lives were being saved by that substance. It was perhaps in gunshot wounds of bone and joint that penicillin had done most for the wounded soldier. In civilian surgery its use in osteomyelitis revolutionised its treatment. ' As well as a knowledge of the effects of high altitudes, the speaker said, the Air Force had contributed much to the knowledge of burns. To this knowledge many n child who pulled on the :" rd of au electric jug would owe its Ufe.

MASS RADIOLOGY. Apologising for introducing the senior service last, Dr Moore said that the greatest advance in the work done by his profession attached to the Navy had been the introduction of a mass radiological examination of the chest. Tuberculosis had always been a serious cause of invalidism in the Navy, possibly partly due to the lowered resistance associated with the lack of fresh food, but probably more dependent upon the unavoidable crowding of the housing quarters. From mass radiography reports it was found that roughly three in any 1,000 of the population had undetected tuberculosis _of the lungs, and that risk of infection to others was avoidable and could be avoided. Sea-sickness had also been studied, and drugs of the belladonna group had a significant effect. OBSTETRICAL SOCIETY. The announcement that the noted British obstetrician, Professor Sir William Fletcher Shaw, would visit New Zealand in September, was made at the annual meeting of the New Zea-

land Obstrefrical and Gynaecological Society. Sir William is being sent to the Dominion by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, London, at the invitation of the New Zealand Society. He is to advise upon the foundation principles of the Auckland post-graduate O. and G. Hospital in order that tliis centre, which has now been endowed, may be recognised by the Royal College as a training school for its higher examinations. Sir William, who is at present chairman of the Royal College's Committee for Dominion Affairs, was president of the college from 1938 to 1943. The officers elected were:—President, Dr 'Geoffrey Fisher (Auckland); vicepresident, Dr Leslie Averill (Christchurch) ; honorary secretary, Dr Jefcoate Harbutt (Auckland) ; assistant secretary, Dr Alistair Macfarlane (Auckland); honorary treasurer, Dr I F. R. Smale (Auckland).