William Shippen Jr –
US obstetrician
Experience is the mother of truth; and by
experience we learn wisdom.
Quoted by Betsy C. Corner in William Shippen, Jr.
Herb Shriner
Contemporary US comic
Our doctor would never really operate unless it
was necessary. He was just that way. If he didn’t
need the money, he wouldn’t lay a hand on you.
Attributed
Aloysius Sieffert (c.)
The care of the human mind is the most noble
branch of medicine.
Medical and Surgical Practitioner’s Memorandum
Henry E. Sigerist –
Swiss-born US medical historian
Hospitals are the temples of medicine. What may
not always be possible in private practice must be
possible in a hospital.
American MedicineCh. . New York
The task of medicine is to promote health, to
prevent disease, to treat the sick when prevention
has broken down and to rehabilitate the people
after they have been cured. These are highly social
functions and we must look at medicine as
basically a social science.
Civilisation and DiseaseCh. . Phoenix Books, New York
()
At all times disease isolated its victims socially
because their lives are different from those of
healthy people.
Civilisation and Diseasep. . Phoenix Books, New York
()
Most dangerous to society was an unskilled
surgeon. The damage he could do was immediate
and apparent to all.
Civilisation and Diseasep. . Phoenix Books, New York
()
The problem of abortion is serious. In pre-Hitler
Germany it was estimated that the country lost
more women from septic abortion than from
tuberculosis.
Civilisation and Diseasep. . Phoenix Books, New York
()
It is very probable that euthanasia is actually
practised by conscientious physicians much more
often than we know.
Civilisation and Diseasep. . Phoenix Books, New York
()
Illness, in general, is not a good literary subject.
Civilisation and Diseasep. . Phoenix Books, New York
()
Disease is a dynamic process. It has a beginning –
slow or sudden – develops, reaches in many cases
an acme, and ends in recovery or death.
Civilisation and Diseasep. . Phoenix Books, New York
()
A determining point in the history of
gynecology is to be found in the fact that
sex plays a more important part in the life of
woman than in that of man, and that she is
more burdened by her sex.
American Journals of Obstetrics and Gynecology: ()
Health cannot be forced upon the people. It cannot
be dispensed to the people. They must want it and
be prepared to do their share and to cooperate fully
in whatever health program a country develops.
Canadian Journal of Public Health: ()
We see the physician as scientist, educator and
social worker, ready to cooperate in teamwork, in
close touch with the people he disinterestedly serves.
Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society:
()
Disease creates poverty and poverty disease. The
vicious circle is closed.
Medicine and Human WelfareCh.
Prevention of disease must become the goal of
every physician.
Medicine and Human WelfareCh.
The technology of medicine has outrun its
sociology.
Medicine and Human WelfareCh.
The very popular hunting for ‘Fathers’ of every
branch of medicine is rather foolish, it is unfair
not only to the mothers and ancestors but also to
the obstetricians and midwives.
A History of MedicineVol. . Oxford University Press,
Oxford ()
We must also keep in mind that discoveries are
usually not made by one man alone, but that
many brains and many hands are needed before a
discovery is made for which one man receives the
credit.
A History of MedicineVol. . Oxford University Press,
Oxford ()
Hawi (c.2500 BC) attended to both ends of the
gastrointestinal tract by being both physician of
the teeth and guardian of the anus.
A History of MedicineVol. , Ch. . Oxford University Press,
Oxford ()
No doctors live on in the memory save the
exceptional beings who enriched the healing art
with new outlooks, who forged new weapons for
the fight against disease.
The Great DoctorsPreface
Patients must be adjusted socially as well as
medically. The physicians must thus also play a
social role.
Quoted in Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied
Sciences: ()
Disease has social as well as physical, chemical,
and biological causes.
Attributed · .