The influence of women in the profession of medicine : Address given at the opening of the winter session of the London School of Medicine for Women.

  • Blackwell, Elizabeth, 1821-1910.
Date:
1890
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The influence of women in the profession of medicine : Address given at the opening of the winter session of the London School of Medicine for Women. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    women and men, who grow up under our ministrations, what an inspirer of nobleness and purity, what a guardian from temptation the true physician can be ! Again, in the treatment of the poor, an immense demand is made upon our pity, patience and courage. These poor victims of our social stupidity are often extremely trying ! The faulty arrangements which compel us to see thirty, fifty even, in an hour, exhaust the nervous system of the doctor. It requires faith and courage to recognize the real .equal human soul under the terrible mask of squalor and disease, in these crowded masses of poverty, and to resist the temptation to regard them as clinical ma- terial. The attitude of the student and doctor to the sick poor is a real test of the true physician. Having thus realized the profound adaptation of the nature of women to the practice of the Art of Healing, let lis consider in what way the intellectual faculties may be strengthened so as to give enlarged efficiency to the maternal qualities. In other words, how shall we become reliable doctors ? What I have hitherto dwelt on is the necessary attitude of mind, or the atmosphere and light in which women physicians must breathe and work if they are to attain to their distinctive efficiency; let me now refer more particularly to the method of training for our practical work. The intellectual training required for the physician