IRA S. WILE, M. S., M. D. 219 



his teaching. There is, to be sure, more of a shortage of com- 

 petent teachers in this branch of medicine than in almost any 

 other part of the curriculum. It is not necessary that an effort 

 be made to turn out specialists, but as every physician is called 

 upon to care for infants, he should at least be taught as much 

 about them and the conditions peculiar to them as about per- 

 forming the numerous operations that he may never have a chance 

 to perform or even see. 



The University of Michigan, for example, devotes 185 hours 

 to gynecological clinics, 160 hours to bacteriological laboratory 

 work, and only 60 hours to lectures, clinics, and recitations on 

 the diseases of children. 



Philanthropic societies too frequently complain of the poor 

 services that are offered to patients. Physicians are severely 

 criticised for giving mothers poor advice. Carry the criticism 

 back to the teachers of pediatrics in the medical schools. At 

 the meeting which gave birth to this organization Gerstenberger 

 called attention to the existing conditions "which have to a very 

 large degree prevented or rather neglected the establishment of 

 the proper and adequate means to teach that are to blame for 

 this shortcoming." Let the medical schools recognize their re- 

 sponsibility for the poor results that their graduates have shown 

 in the realm of diseases of infancy. Let independent depart- 

 ments be organized for giving instruction and training in the 

 hygiene of infancy and the treatment of the diseases of infancy. 



The subcommittee of the Council on Education of the Ameri- 

 can Medical Association recommended that in a medical cur- 

 riculum covering 4,100 hours 180 hours should be spent upon 

 pediatrics. This estimate was cut down to 100 hours. Hygiene 

 and medical jurisprudence were cut down to about 30 hours. 

 In the curriculum advised by the Association of American Col- 

 leges pediatrics was assigned 100 hours, hygiene 30 hours and 

 obstetrics 100 hours. If this curriculum were to be established 

 and 60 of the 100 hours, as advised, were to be given over to 

 clinics, would medical schools be prepared to live up to the stand- 

 ard? The Council on Medical Education considered one patient 

 for each two clinical students essential for proper clinical facili- 

 ties. Its estimation of 100 medical patients for a school having 

 100 in each class or 200 in the last two classes did not include 

 pediatric, nervous or mental diseases. While clinical facilities 

 are already lacking in many colleges, there is an especial lack 

 of pediatric material under the present system of hospital man- 

 agement. There may be plenty of clinics, but students do not 

 have access to them during the period of their student life. Gen- 

 eral hospitals fail for the most part to have special wards for 



