Private medical practice

“ Advantages to Science from the Improvement of the Mortuary Registration. § 208. Extending the view from the private and public immediate and extraordinary necessities which may be met by a staff of well qualified public officers, exercising the duties and powers proposed, to the ordinary but higher public wants, it will be found they may in that position obtain in years, or even in months, indications of the certain means of prevention of disease, for which the medical experience of ages has supplied no means of cure, and only doubtful means of alleviation. ”

“ Medical officers, as private practitioners, are often dependent for their important private practice, and even for their office, on persons whom its strict performance might subject to expense or place in the position of defendants. ”

“ We scarcely realize how far we have gone in the socialization of medicine. It is impossible to go back, or to stand still. The services of the medical profession are needed, not only to provide the necessary service, but in helping to determine its conditions. One essential item will be the substitution for fees during sickness of an annual payment to private practitioners by each family for supervising its members in health, for inquiry into their industrial and domestic life, so far as it contains elements inimical to health, and for giving preventive more than curative advice. ”

“ It is true in an even more marked and undeniable fashion that the profession of medicine, by virtue of its public and social aspects, is distinguished in a marked way from a calling in life in which a man might feel that what he did was strictly his own business, subject to nobody's scrutiny, or inquiry, or interference. The physician's public obligation is in part prescribed by the laws of the State which regulate medical practice, and in very large part by the professional codes which have been evolved by the profession itself for its own guidance. ”

“ The second and most urgent element consists in the organization of hospital and consultative expert services for all, which, while greatly increasing each patient’s prospect of prompt recovery, will enable the general practitioner to escape from the soul-destroying inefficiency of unaided medical practice. ”

“ A new and in many respects a nobler conception of medicine has been developed. Formerly medical practice was almost exclusively a personal service to the sick individual, and measures looking toward the general relief of disease and its prevention received scanty consideration. The idea of a wider service to the city, to the state, to the nation, to humanity rather than the personal service to the individual, is becoming dominant in medicine. ”

“ That the work done on behalf of the community, plus the work accomplished by private medical practitioners, is not equal to national needs is obvious to any one considering the vast amount of avoidable disease in our midst. Why is this and what is the remedy? A partial answer is given by English experience. The medical provision made in a large proportion of cases is belated and inadequate; and in perhaps a still larger proportion of cases medical advice is not obtained, or being obtained, is not followed. This applies even more to hygienic than to clinical medical advice. ”

“ Another of the duties of the Department of Health was to examine every person that applied to practice medicine and surgery or to engage in any professional calling. The law required a medical examination to be made of the person, who was granted a license every year, so as to keep the professions up to a high standard. ”

“ Rather than be branded a quack, charlatan, or crank, the physician keeps silent as to convictions which do not conform to the text-books. Many a life-saving, health-promoting discovery which ought to be taken up and incorporated into general practice from one end of the country to the other, and which should be made a part of the minimum standard of medical practice and medical agreement, must wait twenty-five or fifty years for recognition. ”

“ It must also be patent to all that the patients themselves cannot possibly receive such effective care in a hospital in which medical research and teaching are not fostered. Why should the burden of maintaining a high standard of entrance to the profession and of preventing incompetent and untrained persons from assuming the responsibility of physicians rest solely on the medical profession, when the object is the protection of private citizens and public health? ”

“ For example, during the 19th and early 20th centuries the burdens of serving as research subjects fell largely upon poor ward patients, while the benefits of improved medical care flowed primarily to private patients. ”

“ In addition, the medical and scientific community, many public and private agencies, and institutions and concerned citizens have, over the years, undertaken valuable efforts to promote public awareness of FAS and related health concerns. ”

“ Whether or not a physician is the official health protector of the community, a physician there should be who can be reached readily by those who need him, and who should be required to produce a certificate of thorough training in both medicine and surgery. If such a medical practitioner does not establish himself in the district voluntarily, the community might well afford to employ such a physician on a salary and make him responsible for the health of all. ”

“ The progress of scientific Medicine in this country cannot for ever depend upon work done through the Government, or Local Medical Services. It must, as in any other great department of life, depend partly upon private effort, that is, on the work of private practitioners. ”

“ The fact is—and it is a fact that is slowly becoming apparent to all—that the private practice of medicine is out of date. It fails to answer the needs of our time. There are various reasons why this should be the case, but two are fundamental. ”

“ Disciplining and inspecting entrepreneurial and private forms of medicine and articulating them with the national health service, in such a way as to ensure adequate standards of efficiency and quality in both public and private healthcare institutions ”

“ The secret nostrum business in some of its phases has assiduously found its way into the medical arts, and physicians, pharmacists, and manufacturing houses, seem to have forgotten, to a certain extent, the obligations which they owe to the public. Medicine, in all its departments, must be practiced in accord with scientific, and professional requirement, or it will sink to the level of a commercial business. The end of medical practice is service to suffering humanity, not the acquisition of money. ”

“ Establishing community-based health teams to support small-practice medical homes by assisting the primary care practitioner in chronic care management, including patient self-management, activities. ` (ix) Assisting applicable individuals in making informed health care choices by paying providers of services and suppliers for using patient decision-support tools, including tools that meet the standards developed and identified under section 936 (c) (2) (A) of the Public Health Service Act, that improve applicable individual and caregiver understanding of medical treatment options. ”

“ Article 33
⁠Citizens shall be treated with respect when they receive medical and healthcare services. Medical and healthcare institutions, and medical and healthcare professionals shall care for patients and treat patients equally, respect patients' personal dignity, and protect patients' privacy. ”

“ Is it not obvious that there should be a staff of medical officers and orderlies, detached altogether from any association with the treatment of disease, who should devote themselves entirely to the problem of prevention? ”

“ Managed care has transformed medicine in America — driving down costs, but threatening to drive down quality as well. I think we ought to say to every American: You should have the right to know all your medical options — not just the cheapest. If you need a specialist, you should have a right to see one. You should have the right to emergency care if you're in an accident. ”

“ It will say the patient protections should apply to all Americans; patient protections should be comprehensive; that patients should have a rapid medical review process for denials of care; the review process should ensure that doctors make medical decisions and patients receive care in a timely manner; federal remedies should be expanded to hold health plans accountable; and patient protection legislation should encourage, not discourage, employers to offer health care. ”

“ For its sins of omission, as for its sins of commission, the medical profession shares responsibility with laymen. For years leading educators, business men, hospital directors, public officials, have known that communicable diseases could be stamped out. ”

“ General practitioners shall mainly provide such services as diagnosis, treatment, referral, prevention, healthcare and rehabilitation of common diseases and frequently-occurring diseases, chronic diseases management, and health management. ”

“ We will respond to public health accidents promptly, publicly, and effectively. We will work to ensure that medical practitioners remain motivated and that interactions between doctor and patient are amicable. ”

“ Strong told his subordinates; and, enlisting the services of the great body of physicians,—there is no other class of men so trained and inspired to altruistic public service as the medical profession,—he instituted a house-to-house search for hidden or undiscovered cases. ”

“ These should be backed by the most eminent and conscientious men in the profession. They should be managed by men fully competent, and should be open not only to physicians who need treatment and are unable to pay for it at a private institution, but to all patients, in the certainty that there they will receive the proper treatment, properly administered, and at a reasonable charge. I purpose furthermore that every institution under private management in the United States shall by law be held responsible for its methods of treatment. ”

“ Your presence here this day, stamps with your approval the general principle which is involved in our society, and shews that at any rate, the founders of this institution did not make a wrong estimate of the desire, which exists amongst provincial medical practitioners, to advance medical science, and to promote among themselves that harmony and social feeling, which ought ever to characterise a liberal profession. ”

“ It is not merely our object to show that, in common with other gentlemen, medical practitioners should have some general knowledge of the law, without which they cannot in any scene of life discharge properly their duty either to the public or themselves; but to demonstrate, that there are many and intricate branches of law, in which the physician or surgeon, by competent knowledge, may not only materially serve himself in reputation, and his patients by advice, but also render important benefit to the community. ”

“ The health department of a modern city is charged with a double duty: it has to care for cases of disease, and it has to suggest and enforce laws to keep the city sanitary. The former task—the treatment of sickness—is much more widely recognized as the proper function of the medical profession ”

“ For Practitioners must be paid for their time and attendance, as well as for their Medicines, under whatever name they make the charge. Indeed the most extensive practice otherwise would be insufficient to support a family in a becoming manner, as the greatest part of their time is employed in visiting the sick. The paying of a physician for attendance and the apothecary for his Medicines apart is certainly the most eligible mode of practice, both to patient and practitioner. ”

“ Opinions differ widely as to the evils and remedies, but few are found to commend the existing state of things. This subject is closely connected with the advancement of science, for, if the profession were constituted as it ought to be, and as reason and sound principles dictate, the harmony that would be thus established among the several departments, could not fail to prove a direct means of their co-operating more cordially and efficiently in extending the science and improving the practice. ”

“ The patient's response to the inadequacy and inefficiency of polyclinic health care has been to seek out a physician with a private practice and pay the necessary fee. Approximately one-fourth of the polyclinic physicians have a private practice during nonduty hours, as do almost all specialists. By consulting a private physician rather than the free polyclinic, the patient can choose his own doctor and establish a personal relationship with him, hoping to develop confidence and receive more effective treatment. ”

“ Dentist, Physician Assistant, Pharmacist, Behavioral and Mental Health Professional, Public Health Professional, and Nurse Training- The Surgeon General shall establish provisions applicable with respect to dental, physician assistant, pharmacy, behavioral and mental health, public health, and nursing students that are comparable to those for medical students under this section, including service obligations, tuition support, and stipend support. ”

“ For the great benefit and advantage of the community, Medical Boards have recently been announced in various parts of the Metropolis, where, according to the assertions of the Principals, in their advertisements, every disease incident to human nature is treated by men of skilful practice ”