Large Fees and How to Get Them: A book for the private use of physiciansHarmon, Albert V.
Science
Large Fees and How to Get Them: A book for the private use of physicians
Harmon, Albert V.
Medical fees
Yet the professional dodo—my apologies to the shade
of the “sure enough” dodo—will not learn. He goes on
and on, neglecting his accounts, mainly because he is
afraid of offending his patrons and driving them off to
some other doctor who isn’t so particular; and the worst
of it is, there are plenty of contemptible fellows who draw
their own salaries promptly when due, or present their
bills for goods with frantic haste, who consider a doctor’s
bill a flagrant insult. Will nothing ever inspire the doctor
with courage enough to despise and ignore such contemptible
trash? Does he prefer the role of a lickspittle
to that of an independent and self-reliant man?
As illustrations of the value the profession sets on its
skill and learning, the amount of gratuitous work done is
striking. Our pauper—or pauperized—patrons are divided
into several classes, viz.: 1. The free hospital, clinic and
dispensary class. This is on the increase. According to
Dr. Frederick Holme Wiggin, 51 per cent of all cases of
14sickness in New York City are now classed medically as
paupers, as against 1.5 per cent twenty years ago! This
is appalling. Of these alleged paupers it is safe to say
that 75 per cent are able to pay full or at least fairly good
fees. Why should pauperism be shown so prominently in
the matter of medical bills, as compared with other necessities
of life? And why should the profession carry a
burden that belongs to the public? 2. Free patients of
the private class: (a) those who can pay but will not, i.e.,
dead beats, and swindlers; (b) persons whose circumstances
are such that the doctor feels in duty bound to
render no bills; (c) persons who presume upon social
acquaintance with the doctor to “hold him up” for
friendly, perhaps informal, consultations.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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