MEDICAL JURISPRUDENCE deals with the relation ships of law and medicine. A registered medical practitioner is one whose name appears on the register kept by the General Medical Council established under the Medical Acts of 1858 to 1886 to set up standards of professional knowledge, to keep a register of men and women who reach this standard and to deprive of their qualifications those whom the council finds guilty of "in famous conduct in a professional respect." This body is not to be confounded with the British Medical Association, a voluntary association comprising 64% of the medical men and women on the register.
The elements of medical jurisprudence form part of the curric ulum of every examining body approved by the General Medical Council. The introductory part of this study treats of the doctor as witness, a medical man being in the nature of things often asked in a court of law to give his opinion as well as to testify as to facts. (See EVIDENCE.) At the threshold of this subject stands the question of so-called medical privilege. (See PRIVILEGE.) Is a doctor pound to disclose in a court of law communications made to him by his patient? The law recognizes no such thing as medi cal privilege in the sense that there is legal privilege, nor is the reason far to seek. A medical man is consulted about questions which are or ought to be unconnected with the law ; a patient does not ask a doctor to undertake his defence in a case before the courts. A medical witness appearing as such should never in any sense be an advocate and must not take sides. whether he be called for the plaintiff or for the defendant. Medical writers themselves hold this ideal up to the profession although in practice it is not always adhered to. Many medical men on graduation take, and all reputable medical men consider themselves bound by, the Hip pocratic oath, the relevant part of which is as follows : "What soever in connection with my professional practice or even out side of it I see or hear in the life of men which ought not to be spoken of I will not divulge." The italics are important. It is clear that it is required of medical men, as it is required of bankers, that they shall not gossip. When however the law requires it, it is clearly proper to divulge such matters indeed it will be contempt of court to refuse to do so. On the other hand, it will not be proper to divulge certain matters under any other circumstances, for example, to the executive, who have not the authority, though they often assume it, of the judiciary. (See CONSTITUTIONAL
LAW.) The notification of Infectious Diseases Act 1889 and many others show that medical privilege is no more recognized by statute law than it is by the common law. The list of acts of parliament which affect medical men is a long and formidable one. Not all of these, however, are considered as forming the subject matter of medical jurisprudence, the majority of them are considered to belong rather to the domain of public health (q.v.).
The precision required for elucidation of medico-legal problems will sometimes exceed and sometimes fall short of that required by science ; that is to say, the law will at times be content with what may seem rough and ready methods, while at others it is necessary to decide between the diametrically opposed views of medical experts of equal eminence. Obviously the law, by its very nature conservative, must lag a little behind contemporary science, for the interests of justice require not theories nor even hypoth eses but facts. The law's routine relations are rather with medi cine as an art than medicine as a science. This fact is apt to be lost sight of when the so-called expert is extolled at the expense of the general practitioner whose very name denotes that he deals with the realities of life rather than with theories. For this reason medical practitioners enjoy a certain equality in the eyes of the law (nor have we any system as obtains in France where a panel of experts, called medecins legistes and consisting of pathologists, toxicologists, gynaecologists and alienists, is drawn up every year by the court). The certificate under the Lunacy Acts may be signed by any registered medical practitioner, although one of the two medical certificates required by s. 5(3) of the Mental Treat ment Act 193o in cases of "temporary treatment without certifi cation" [sic] may be signed only by a practitioner of five years standing approved by the Board of Control. The coroner (q.v.) will in difficult cases of course prefer to have the services of a pathologist or of a toxicologist, that is, of men whose read ing and practice specially qualify them for the determination of the causes of death, but no such persons are known to the law.