Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-08T02:12:28.563Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Medicolegal History: A Review of Significant Publications and Educational Developments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 April 2021

Emil F. Frey
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The development of the medicolegal field in the United States has followed an uneven course, marked by successions of rich and fallow periods. By the beginning of the nineteenth century a number of universities had qualified professors of medical jurisprudence on their faculties, and the field appeared to be in full flower. Yet, in 1876. a well-known American medical professor and dean, Stanford Emerson Chaille, wrote with some bitterness of the deplorable state of medical jurisprudence in this country. Today, there is considerable interest in the field, but the comparative dearth of medicolegal instruction at medical schools remains an issue.

This article briefly traces the development in the United States of the medicolegal field, which for our purposes encompasses the legal questions concerning medicine and allied sciences Selected advances in education and publishing are highlighted; lastly, the article reviews those problems which appear to have prevented the full development of this field.

Type
Article
Information
Law, Medicine and Healthcare , Volume 10 , Issue 2 , April 1982 , pp. 56 - 60
Copyright
Copyright © 1982 American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Smith, S., The Development of Forensic Medicine and Law-Science Relations, Journal of Public Law 3(2): 304, 317 (Fall 1954).Google Scholar
Nemec, J., International Bibliography of Medicolegal Serials: 1736–1967 (U.S. Dept. of Health, Education and Welfare, Washington, D.C.) (1969) at 1.Google Scholar
Id. at 4-8.Google Scholar
Nemec, J., International Bibliography of the History of Legal Medicine (U.S. Dept. of Health, Education and Welfare, Washington, D.C.) (1975) at 37-38.Google Scholar
Shastid, T.H., Medical Jurisprudence in A Cyclopedia of American Medical Biography, vol. 1 (W.B. Saunders, Philadelphia) (Kelly, H. ed. 1912) at lxxxii.Google Scholar
Curran, W.J., Titles in the Medicolegal Field: A Proposal for Reform, American Journal of Law & Medicine 1(1):1 (March 1975) at 5, quoting Rush, B., Sixteen Introductory Lectures (Bradford and Innskeep, Philadelphia) (1811) at 363.Google ScholarPubMed
Stringham, J.S., American Medical and Philosophical Register (1814) cited in A Cyclopedia of American Medical Biography, vol. 1 (W.B. Saunders, Philadelphia) (Kelly H., ed. 1912) at lxxvii.Google Scholar
Beck, T.R., Elements of Medical Jurisprudence (Webster and Skinner, Albany) (1823), cited in Shastid, supra note 5 at lxxvii-iii.Google Scholar
Ray, I., Treatise on Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity (Little & Brown, Boston) (1838) cited in Nemec, J., Highlights in Medicolegal Relations (U.S. Dept. of Health Education and Welfare, Washington, D.C.) (1976) at 82. See M'Naghten's Case, 8 Eng. Rep. 718 (1843).Google Scholar
Dean, A., Principles of Medical Jurisprudence: Designed for the Professions of Law & Medicine (1850) cited in Shastid, , supra note 5, at lxxix.Google Scholar
Wharton, F. Stillé, M., A Treatise on Medical Jurisprudence (Kay, Philadelphia) (1855) cited in Nemec, , supra note 9, at 87.Google Scholar
Hamilton, F.H., Deformities after Fractures (Collins, Philadelphia) (1855) cited in Nemec, , supra note 9, at 87.Google Scholar
Nemec, , supra note 9, at 86.Google Scholar
Elwell, J.J., A Medico-legal Treatise on Malpractice and Medical Evidence: Comprising the Elements of Medical Jurisprudence (Baker, Voorhis, New York) (1860) cited in Nemec, , supra note 9, at 88.Google Scholar
Burns, C.R., Malpractice Suits in American Medicine Before the Civil War. in Legacies in Law and Medicine (Science History Pubs., New York) (1977) at 120.Google Scholar
Nemec, , supra note 9, at 90; Shastid, , supra note 5, at lxxx.Google Scholar
Ordronaux, J., Jurisprudence of Medicine (1869) and Judicial Aspects of Insanity (1878) cited in Cyclopedia supra note 5, vol. 2 at 227.Google Scholar
Nemec, , supra note 9, at 96-97.Google Scholar
Nemec, , supra note 2, at 8-9.Google Scholar
Curran, W.J., Letter, Background of Forensic Medicine, Medical World News 12(15): 12 (April 16, 1971).Google Scholar
Shastid, , supra note 5, at lxxxii-iii.Google Scholar
Davis, N.S., History of Medical Education and Institutions in the United States (S.C. Griggs, Chicago) (1851) at 178.Google Scholar
Curran, , supra note 20.Google Scholar
Rothstein, W., American Physicians in the Nineteenth Century (Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore) (1972) at 238.Google Scholar
Martland, H.S., The Teaching of Forensic Medicine, New York State Journal of Medicine 36(17): 1193 (1936).Google Scholar
Shastid, , supra note 5, at lxxxiii-iv.Google Scholar
Nemec, , supra note 9, at 99.Google Scholar
Martland, , supra note 25, at 1193.Google Scholar
Nemec, supra note 2, at 11.Google Scholar
Gradwohl, R.B., The Origin of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, Journal of Forensic Sciences 1(4): 7–9 (1956).Google Scholar
Report of Committee on Medicolegal Problems, A Suggested Course in Legal Medicine for Medical Schools, Journal of the American Medical Association 150(7): 716 (October 18, 1952).Google Scholar
Fisher, R.S., Teaching Medical Law, Journal of the American Medical Association 205(12): 245 (September 16, 1968) at 245.Google ScholarPubMed
Nemec, , supra note 9, at 107.Google Scholar
Id. at 112.Google Scholar
Id.Google Scholar
Burns, C.R., Professional Ethics and the Development of American Law as Applied to Medicine. in Legacies in Law and Medicine, supra note 15, at 299-310.Google Scholar
Ficarra, B.J., A History of Legal Medicine, Legal Medicine Annual (Appleton-Century-Crofts, New York) (Wecht, C., ed. 1976) at 21.Google Scholar
Nemec, , supra note 2.Google Scholar
Curran, , supra note 6, at 10-11.Google Scholar
Ficarra, , supra note 37, at 24 For a more detailed analysis, see Curran, W.J. Shapiro, E.D., Law, Medicine and Forensic Science (Little, Brown & Co., Boston) (2nd ed. 1970) at chap. 1.Google Scholar
Grumet, B., Legal Medicine in Medical Schools: A Survey of the State of the Art, Journal of Medical Education 54:755 (1979) cited in Schwartz R.L., Teaching Physicians and Lawyers to Understand Each Other, Journal of Legal Medicine 2(2): 131 (June 1981) at 138-39.Google ScholarPubMed
See, e.g., Curran, W.J. Shapiro, E.D., Law, Medicine and Forensic Science (Little Brown, Boston) (3rd ed. 1982); Sharpe, Fiscina, Head, , Cases and Materials on Law and Medicine (1979); and Wadlington, Waltz, Dworkin, , Cases and Materials on Law and Medicine (1980). Schwartz, R.L., Teaching Physicians and Lawyers to Understand Each Other, supra note 41.Google Scholar
Norton, M.L., Development of Interdisciplinary Program of Instruction in Medicine and Law, Journal of Medical Education 46(5): 405, 408 (May 1971).Google ScholarPubMed
“Legal Medicine: the specialty areas of medicine concerned with relations with substantive law and with legal institutions. Clinical medical areas—such as the treatment of offenders and trauma medicine related to law would be included herein.” Curran, supra note 6, at 11.Google Scholar