HOSPITAL MATTERS.

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 1588, 14 June 1920, Page 5

HOSPITAL MATTERS.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —I have nothing- to complain of in your morning- hate of Saturday, except the right of every public man to have his utterances correctly reported if they are made the subject of editorial comment. Your reporter takes his notes in longhand and cannot give a verbatim report, so I must trouble you now to publish -what I did say on the matter of medical staffing of the public hospital at the last meeting, to the accuracy of which any member of the Board can vouch. The subject under discussion was the letter written by some of the doctors against the division of the staff of the hospital into physicians and surgeons, which letter, as I could plainly see, was in danger of losing its value by its fighting tone and the paradox of one of the signatures. No Board will be bullied, and logic is a necessary factor in a considered opinion. After other people had spoken, I said: — “I think the Board ought to be very patient in this matter, as it is quite apparent these doctors have not been present at the Board meetings (not the B.M.A. meetings, as stated in your article), and do not know how the Board intends to safeguard their prestige and what has been going on. The Board has given every possible consideration to their prestige. This is a very difficult business, and I have based the scheme, which the Board has accepted with modifications, on the fact that nearly every hospital in the -world over 100 beds divides its work into a surgical side, a medical side, and a specialist side; that there were three types of medical men always in practice which one had to consider: (1) The man who was rich and lucky enough to buy a large practice, and so almost immediately enjoy rich friends to push him along; (2) the man who had done well in other towns, and -whose experience gave him great advantages, and who was therefore sometimes ready to knock your head off if you didn’t agree with him; (3) the man who had very little money, not so fortunate, who sets up in practice and earnestly and honestly laid himself out to earn a living. It was these they wanted to help (by having other than ‘ surgical ’ appointments open). The top dog should not receive all the consideration. There were some doctors in every town who were not capable of taking on the surgical work which comes to hand in a large public hospital, and one of the signatories had described surgery as a blood-letting process, or said that he had no sympathy with operations, believing them useless. I do not see why he should object to the system. It seemed that the doctors wanted to make a plan of their own, but I don’t think for one moment that there is any threat meant in the letter, and if there is the Board will know how to deal with it. The measure of the prestige the doctors "will lose is the length of time they insist on drawing attention to it. The question is-acute now. Once it is in working the injustices complained of will not be apparent. Bet’s try it!” The above is a word for word report of my remarks, part of which was, I think, very rightly omitted by your reporter, as, whatever laults I have, want of clarity in expression is not one of them. If the public can be made to think the doctors are against me I should no doubt gain sympathy, but that aspect does not enter into it at all. This is a question having several sides and many separate interests, in which I stand to lose nothing. Public controversy and clever remarks are out of the question. 1 cannot comment on the scheme, since the Board has accepted it, but 1 may perhaps be permitted to say that the Board and possibly the public are pretty full up of it.—l am, etc., B. EDGAR WHITAKER.

fAs we said on Saturday, the question as it concerns the Board and the. public is not whether doctors are fat. or lean, or “top dogs” or “bottom Jogs,” either physically, socially or

financially. The question is: How can we obtain the services of the most competent doctors? Hr. Whitakers “scheme” is to instal one set of medical practitioners to sit in judgment upon and select their colleagues. The Board (which has abrogated a. function in this particular case) is to be consulted. nominally, but will, de facto, merely endorse whatever is done by its advisers! How could it do otherwise? This means ine\itably that some eminent men in the profession will not risk what to them means a possible indignity, and the patients will lose their services. Therefore the arrangement is a bad one as far as the public is concerned, (nd td'at is really all that we are cons corned about.—Kd. M.H.T.]