ADVERTISING.
Having thoroughly qualified himself for the practice of some particular branch of the healing art, the specialist sees no impropriety in acquainting the public with his ability to relieve certain forms of suffering. He believes that medical men should possess equal rights with other business men, and that any code of medical ethics which would deprive him of any of the sacred rights guaranteed to all by the liberal laws of the country, is professional tyranny, and merits only his contemptuous disregard. Nor does he display any false modesty in the manner of making known his skill. He maintains that he has an undoubted right to place his claim to patronage before the public by every fair and honorable means. He recognizes the display of goods in the merchant's show-windows as no less an advertisement and in no better taste than the publication of a card in the newspaper. So, likewise, he regards the various devices by which the extremely ethical physician seeks to place himself conspicuously before the public, as but so many ways of advertising, and as not more modest than the publication of cures actually performed, or than his announcement through the public press of his professional resources for treating certain maladies.
The physician who expresses a "holy horror" of the "advertising doctor," liberally bestowing upon him the epithet of "quack," announces himself a graduate, talks learnedly and gives notice to the public in some way that he is ready to serve them. He endeavors to impress upon the mind of the patient and family his skill, frequently exaggerates as to the extent of his practice, rides furiously about when he has no professional calls, keeps up business appearances by driving several horses, or joins influential societies. He may make a great display in style, manner, dress, pretensions, writing for the newspapers, exhibiting literary pedantry, referring to the superior facilities afforded by some particular school or society to which he belongs; or by editing and publishing a medical journal, ostensibly for the advancement of medical science, but practically to display titles or professorships, to publish reports which flatteringly allude to cases he has treated, the number of capital surgical operations he has performed, or the distinguished families he is treating. All these are but modes of advertising professional wares; in short, are artful, though not refined, tricks, resorted to for private announcement. We say to all such adventurers in modern advertising diplomacy, that these indirect, clandestine methods are not half so candid and honorable as a direct public statement of the intentions and proposals of a medical practitioner, who thereby incurs an individual responsibility before the law and his fellow-men.
No good reason has ever been assigned why any well educated physician, trained in the school of experience until he becomes proficient in medical skill, may not publish facts and evidence to disclose it, especially when these are abundant and conclusive. The following extracts from an able article by the Rev. THOMAS K. BEECHER embodies a sound view of the subject of medical advertising. He says:
* * "I am glad that the doctor cured him; I am glad that the doctor put it in the paper that he could cure him. And if any doctor is certain that he can cure such diseases and don't put it in the paper, I am sorry. What a pity it would have been had this doctor come to town with his wealth of science and experience and gone away leaving him uncured! What a pity it would have been if he had been so prejudiced against advertising as to read the responsible certificate of the doctor and give him the go-by as a quack! What are newspapers for, if not to circulate information? What more valuable information can a newspaper give than to tell a sick man where he can be cured? If a man has devoted his life and labor to the study of a special class of diseases, the necessity of his saying so becomes all the more pressing. His duty to advertise becomes imperative.
"When I was in England, I found on all the dead walls of London, placards, declaring that Dean Stanley, Chaplain to the Prince of Wales, would preach at such a place; that his grace the Archbishop (I think) of Canterbury would preach at another time and place; again, that an Oxford professor would preach. In short, religious notices were sprinkled in among the theater bills, and the highest church dignitaries were advertised side by side with actors, singers, and clowns. Of course, I was shocked by it, but in a moment I bethought me—if it be all right and dignified to hire a sexton to ring a bell when the minister is going to preach, it is all the same to silence the bell and hire a bill-sticker to tell the same news, the essential thing being to tell the truth every time. The remedy for the lying advertisements is for honest men to tell the truth. 'When iniquity cometh in like a flood, then the spirit of the Lord lifts up the standard.' A really able man, whatever be his gifts, makes a great mistake if he fail to use those gifts through want of advertising."
If a physician possesses knowledge that enables him to remedy diseases heretofore regarded as incurable, what virtue or modesty is there to "hide his light under a bushel"? In this free country the people think and act for themselves, and hence all have a deep concern in the subject of health. The strong popular prejudice against the doctors who advertise is due to the fact, that by this method so many ignorant charlatans are enabled to palm off their worthless services upon the uneducated and credulous; but the practice of such imposition should not cause a presumption against the public announcement of real skill, for the baser metal bears conclusive evidence that the pure also exists.
Every step in scientific investigation, every proposition which relates to the interest and happiness of man, every statement and appeal involving a valuable consideration, must be submitted to the scrutiny and judgment of individual reason; for every person has the right to form his own conclusions, and justify them by experience. Those claims which are only supported by empty assertion are very doubtful. Misty theories vanish before the sun of truth. He who renders professional services cannot be successful, unless he be sustained by real merit.