was the usual procedure, and it that think possessed many and obvious at present obtaining. that We advantages over
perienced
seniors
we
cannot think once
EDUCATION
IN TROPICAL DISEASE.
Dr. Patrick Hanson in his address at the opening of the winter session of the e School at St. George's Hospital struck a no e 6 which will waken a sympathetic echo in heart of many practitioners in this country, majority of the men coming out to India iom
,c^
the British schools possess little moietian of the diseases of the tiopics , indeed, we should not be far from the truth in assuming them to be entirely ignorant from tie clinical of view. It is not easy to see how
book-knowledge point
that the young officer who is at a regiment or for a month or
either sent to station
so
to
as
much of
a
hospital for British troops learns tropical disease as he would have
done had he been sent to a civil hospital with a large practice among the natives of the country ; in the case of Indian Medical Service men the
advantages of the latter course ai-e so obvious that they hardly need any further demonstration. "Regimental charge though it naturally falls to the share and is the
be said to afford
a
duty
of
field for the
all, yet cannot acquirement of
knowledge in a professional sense.
We fear that
very little can be done to increase the educational facilities of young officers in this regard without asking at once for an increase in the
this can be avoided, for the best student in the cadre of the Indian Medical Service, and this schools cannot learn his diseases without clinica step, as is reasonable when additional expendimaterial, and with the exception of the Dread- ture is involved, would require the support of for seamen at Greenwich, theie irrefutable arguments as to its necessity. It is where any collection of in our opinion certain that the question of affordin London hospital tropical diseases is to be seen and even theie the ing opportunities for further study to the officers collection is small and variable in extent. At of the Army Medical Staff will ere long engage
nought Hospital
is
no
Netley one sees diseases, and it
more than sequelce of added wrecks of men : be may there are healed or healing liver abscesses, chronic and ague, to which must be added the effects of venereal disease in all its
little
dysentery,
the attention of Government, and we would submit that the early education of the young officers of both services new to the tropics in the diseases they are to treat should be considered at the same time.
forms in men who can only be regaided as the Meantime, an attempt might be made to deal victims of the fanaticism of a section of tlieii with the latter problem by posting young officei^ countrymen. Even if there were a good clinical on arrival to stations possessing a large civil hosfield available, it would be permissible to doubt pital and causing them to attend the practice of the utility of studying tropical diseases in a this hospital in addition to any military duty that temperate climate"; the course of the disease might be necessarily allotted to them. This might be modified by the artificial or unnatural arrangement would set free senior officers 011 conditions under which it was studied, and, in- regimental duty in the station for charges more
deed,
many of the commonest diseases of this w< rth their attention and ability. Best of all could not exist at all in England. The would be an arrangement which gave the junior course is to complete the education o men 110 charges of their own at all, and gave
country obvious
the young medical officer in this country under them ample leisure to study the methods of their the supervision of his seniors by attaching him seniors both in civil and military practice ; apart to
a
The unfor- from professional considerations, certain adminisdifficulty in the way is that the services trative problems would be mastered under the are so shorthanded that each man as he arriveseye and hand of the senior officer and a knowis, in nearly every case, at once detailed for dutyledge of office-work acquired which would save and more often than not is in independentthe friction that now and then results from the
large military
or
civil
tunate
charge. do
not now
services of
In former
exist,
were
placing
the
hospital.
put days when, for
the demands
less than
they newly-arrived
on
reasons
whichmeeting
the medicalcalmer
now are,
of and
this plan authorities,
officers under
ex-time
of
youthful
medical
zeal
and
the
trained methods of the lay whether civil or military. This more
training might
be of
the
shortest,
INDIAN MEDICAL GAZETTE.
24
provided
that it
were
Though) of short
course,
of the
right kind;
be laid down
two months could a
man cannot
as
learn
one
or
the limit-
everything
time as two months, yet we maintain that he will at least be better off with that than if, as at present, he is left to fight his own battles in
so
a
if he is a man of a combative he of disposition, may ten incur undeserved odium " in the process of finding his feet."
from the
first; and,
[Jan.
1898.
perienced
seniors
we
cannot think once
EDUCATION
IN TROPICAL DISEASE.
Dr. Patrick Hanson in his address at the opening of the winter session of the e School at St. George's Hospital struck a no e 6 which will waken a sympathetic echo in heart of many practitioners in this country, majority of the men coming out to India iom
,c^
the British schools possess little moietian of the diseases of the tiopics , indeed, we should not be far from the truth in assuming them to be entirely ignorant from tie clinical of view. It is not easy to see how
book-knowledge point
that the young officer who is at a regiment or for a month or
either sent to station
so
to
as
much of
a
hospital for British troops learns tropical disease as he would have
done had he been sent to a civil hospital with a large practice among the natives of the country ; in the case of Indian Medical Service men the
advantages of the latter course ai-e so obvious that they hardly need any further demonstration. "Regimental charge though it naturally falls to the share and is the
be said to afford
a
duty
of
field for the
all, yet cannot acquirement of
knowledge in a professional sense.
We fear that
very little can be done to increase the educational facilities of young officers in this regard without asking at once for an increase in the
this can be avoided, for the best student in the cadre of the Indian Medical Service, and this schools cannot learn his diseases without clinica step, as is reasonable when additional expendimaterial, and with the exception of the Dread- ture is involved, would require the support of for seamen at Greenwich, theie irrefutable arguments as to its necessity. It is where any collection of in our opinion certain that the question of affordin London hospital tropical diseases is to be seen and even theie the ing opportunities for further study to the officers collection is small and variable in extent. At of the Army Medical Staff will ere long engage
nought Hospital
is
no
Netley one sees diseases, and it
more than sequelce of added wrecks of men : be may there are healed or healing liver abscesses, chronic and ague, to which must be added the effects of venereal disease in all its
little
dysentery,
the attention of Government, and we would submit that the early education of the young officers of both services new to the tropics in the diseases they are to treat should be considered at the same time.
forms in men who can only be regaided as the Meantime, an attempt might be made to deal victims of the fanaticism of a section of tlieii with the latter problem by posting young officei^ countrymen. Even if there were a good clinical on arrival to stations possessing a large civil hosfield available, it would be permissible to doubt pital and causing them to attend the practice of the utility of studying tropical diseases in a this hospital in addition to any military duty that temperate climate"; the course of the disease might be necessarily allotted to them. This might be modified by the artificial or unnatural arrangement would set free senior officers 011 conditions under which it was studied, and, in- regimental duty in the station for charges more
deed,
many of the commonest diseases of this w< rth their attention and ability. Best of all could not exist at all in England. The would be an arrangement which gave the junior course is to complete the education o men 110 charges of their own at all, and gave
country obvious
the young medical officer in this country under them ample leisure to study the methods of their the supervision of his seniors by attaching him seniors both in civil and military practice ; apart to
a
The unfor- from professional considerations, certain adminisdifficulty in the way is that the services trative problems would be mastered under the are so shorthanded that each man as he arriveseye and hand of the senior officer and a knowis, in nearly every case, at once detailed for dutyledge of office-work acquired which would save and more often than not is in independentthe friction that now and then results from the
large military
or
civil
tunate
charge. do
not now
services of
In former
exist,
were
placing
the
hospital.
put days when, for
the demands
less than
they newly-arrived
on
reasons
whichmeeting
the medicalcalmer
now are,
of and
this plan authorities,
officers under
ex-time
of
youthful
medical
zeal
and
the
trained methods of the lay whether civil or military. This more
training might
be of
the
shortest,
INDIAN MEDICAL GAZETTE.
24
provided
that it
were
Though) of short
course,
of the
right kind;
be laid down
two months could a
man cannot
as
learn
one
or
the limit-
everything
time as two months, yet we maintain that he will at least be better off with that than if, as at present, he is left to fight his own battles in
so
a
if he is a man of a combative he of disposition, may ten incur undeserved odium " in the process of finding his feet."
from the
first; and,
[Jan.
1898.
