No. 7.

1844.

Report of the Select Committee to whom was Referred the Petition of the Officers and Members of the State Medical Society.

The select committee, to whom was referred the petition of Z. Pitcher and others, officers of the state medical society of Michigan, in relation to the propriety of legalizing the study of anatomy, or the repeal of all law on the subject of the practice of medicine, have had the same under attentive consideration, and respectfully report:

That this committee believe an erroneous impression prevails in many sections of the state, respecting the true object of laws designed to regulate the practice of medicine. Opinions have been frequently advanced, and industriously circulated in our community, that all enactments like those which originally formed part of our code under the revised statutes, requiring a careful preparatory course of study, and examination by medical men, competent to decide upon the qualifications of a candidate before admission to practice, gave exclusive privileges to a favored few, created a monopoly of this branch of science, and established, even in our republican government, where all men are declared "free and equal," an aristocratic body, with the exclusive right of administering to the diseases that "flesh is heir to," and of curing or of killing, in accordance with their own peculiar notions, theories and fancies.

This was so forcibly impressed upon the legislature at its last session, that all the barriers of the medical law against the indiscriminate admission of persons to practice medicine were removed. And under the liberal enactments of this state, the allopathic, the homoephathic, and the hydrophathic physicians, the regular botanic, the irregular steam, root and German urinal doctors, all meet upon the same level, and are fully privileged to experiment upon the human body when diseased, by employing chemicals or vegetables, calomel, red pepper,

or lobelia, in small or large doses, as fancy or interest may suggest. And they may also demand and receive pay for their medicine and attendance, or prosecute and collect the same, whatever course of practice has been pursued.

The legislature wisely provided one guard against the abuse of this privilege, found in page 41, of the session laws of 1843, in the following words "If any person who proposes to be a physician and surgeon, or shall hold himself out to the public or any person employing him, to be such, shall be guilty of any neglect or mal-practice, an action on the case may be maintained against such person so professing, and the rules of common law applicable to such actions against licensed physicians and surgeons, shall be applicable to the

Thus, it is tacitly admitted, that the profession of medicine requires intelligence, peculiar knowledge, and scientific skill, without which, "mal-practice" must frequently occur, and the life of many a valuable citizen be destroyed or rendered incurably miserable.

Damages for mal-practice in the shape of money or property may be of some advantage to the living, but what will it avail the patient after he is dead, after he has been hurried out of the world by the rapacious, misguided, ignorant empiric, who, encouraged by the liberality of our laws, presumed to administer to his disease?

Shakspeare, that admirable observer of all that relates to humanity, pronounces man "the cunningest pattern of excelling nature;" but, by a very slight deviation from the known laws and principles of medicine in treating a disease, perhaps mild and easily curable at its origin, this most perfect specimen of the handi-work of our Creator, may, to carry out the figure of the poet, "become a cistern for foul toads to knot and gender in," a living mass of disease and corrup

tion.

Properly educated physicians require no medical laws to protect them in the pursuit of their high calling. They know their own strength, and scorn the idea of begging for legislative enactments to shield them in the practice of their profession, and the true and only proper object of legislative interference is to guard the people against imposition, by allowing none but those who can exhibit evidences of knowledge in this difficult and important branch of science, to pre

scribe professionally for the almost infinite variety of diseases to which the human system is liable.

Therefore, the eminently respectable physicians and surgeons, whose petition is under consideration, ask for no medical laws to guard their own pecuniary interests, but respectfully request the legislature to legalize the study of anatomy in this state; which appears the more reasonable and proper, as ignorance of this branch of know. ledge mnst inevitably lead to the commission of the very "mal-practice" punishable by our laws. To show the propriety and importance of the request, let us dwell for a moment upon the peculiar knowledge required of a physician, before he is worthy of the name, or authorized, on any moral principle, to tamper with human life, by prescribing for disease.

The science of medicine consists of different departments, amongst which are anatomy, physiology, pathology, surgery, materia medica midwifery, chemistry, and the theory and practice; the latter relating to disease in all its varied forms.

Anatomy comprehends the study of the human structure, and is an exceedingly interesting subject of investigation, though intricate, and requiring close and attentive application to master its minute details; as every part of the system, from the thread-like fibre of a tendon to the largest muscle, including the bones, blood vessels, nerves, glands, &c. must be distinctly traced and carefully examined.

Physiology is a knowledge of the functions and operations of this intricate structure, in a healthy state.

Pathology is a similar knowledge of the body, in a diseased condi

tion.

Physiology unfolds the secret springs of human existence, lays bare the mysterious process by which man is nourished and sustained, and traces the seat of his intellect, to the nervous centre of the brain.— Pathology discovers the hectic glow, seen perhaps for the first time upon the cheek of youth, and traces this symptom of disease to its concealed seat in the lungs. Aided by a stethescope, the experienced pathologist explores the chest, and, by the peculiar sound of the respiratory murmur, detects the incipient germ of consumption-enables the physician to apply the appropriate remedy in season, and frequently saves an interesting patient from a premature grave.

Surgery learns the practitioner how to restore the continuity of parts that have been injured, as in wounds and fractures; and also applies to cases requiring an operation of skill and caution, to relieve the system of dangerous strictures, or of portions of morbid structure equally fatal to health. A skillful surgeon, by the exercise of his art, may save life on the very brink of destruction. In the hands of an empiric, life may be as suddenly destroyed. A skillful surgeon may restore light to the blind, as in cases of cataract; while, in similar cases, a pretender to the art would destroy the prospect of vision forever.

Materia Medica includes the whole range of medical substances, whether mineral or vegetable, simple or compound, and their modes of administration. It sweeps over the wide field of botany and gathers in from the different portions of the earth every known medicinal article, which is here carefully examined and minutely described.

Midwifery relates to the peculiar dificulties and diseases of women, and is an admirably humane and important branch of study, benevolently designed to ameliorate the curse entailed upon woman in the garden of Eden.

Chemistry enables the practitioner to detect the incompatibility of different substances, and prevents the stomach of an invalid from being loaded with drugs, which, when administered singly, might be efficacious, but when injudiciously combined, without regard to chemical principles. may prove poisonous and suddenly destructive.— Many a human being has been killed from a want of proper knowledge of the incompatibility of medicines, while the cause of death remained a secret to the perplexed doctor and mourning friends of the deceased.

It is only proper at this time to allude slightly to the different branches of medical study, their relation to each other, and importance to the physician. But anatomy is the grand arch on which rests the whole superstructure; and a mariner might as well undertake to navigate his ship across the trackless ocean without a compass, as a physician to prescrite successfully for disease without a knowledge of the human system. This knowledge can only be acquired by practical demonstrations on the subject after death, and humanity to the living dictates, that an opportunity should be afforded