GROUP CLINICS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 25, 29 December 1925, Page 4

GROUP CLINICS.

DIAGNOSING STRANGE ILLS. In a house in Brook street, London, a group of medical specialists for the last three years has been working under a system of group diagnosis which will eventually liavo a far-reach-ing effect on consultative practice generally, since by its means patients are saved both time and money while receiving the best possible advice. Under the system each consultant carries on his private practice independently of tho others, but the collective experience and judgment of tho entire group is available for any member of it. A patient suffering from some disease which his own doctor is unable to diagnose or which needs some special form of treatment which the doctor is unable to give, is sent by the latter to one of the members of the group. If the consultant feels that tho patient could be better dealt with by some other members of tho' group he passes him on. Should the patient be suffering from some obscure disease which calls for tho opinion of several specialists, a joint consultation is held for tho patient’s benefit. An American group clinic is usually conducted by a doctor whose colleagues are subordinates, to whom ho pays a fixed salary. This leads to an entirely different result from that obtained under tho English system. In tho Old Country the patient obtains the collective opinion of a number of independent observers; under the American svstem he obtains tho opinion of one ‘consultant, who bases that opinion on" tho evidence of what are practically paid servants. One development of the group system in tho near future will be the erection of a nursing homo where patients will have the advantage of group treatment, as a supplement to group diagnosis.