“That would have been a fair price a few weeks ago, but since then there has been an advance in the cost of the materials and I shall have to charge you $25.”
“All right. Go ahead and fill it. A dollar or so won’t stop me.”
The customer gets an ordinary preparation which any druggist would be glad to sell at 50 or 60 cents, while Messrs. Doem & Doem pocket $12.50, and send a like amount to the enterprising doctor.
Nor is this practice confined to what might be called the tradesmen in medicine, the druggists, the surgical instrument dealers, and so on. It is followed by what are known as high-class surgeons, men of eminence in the profession, and even finds favor among the physicians themselves. It is no uncommon thing for the doctors to exchange patients and divide the fees.
“Really, Mr. ——, you ought to consult Dr. Flubdub about that feature of your case,” a doctor will say to a patient when he has about exhausted him on the fee proposition. “That particular feature is a little out of my line. It needs the attention of an expert specialist in that line, and Dr. Flubdub has made a close study of just such cases.”
So the patient goes to see Dr. Flubdub and the latter is ready for him. He has been advised by phone as to what is coming about as follows:
“Hello, is this Dr. Flubdub? Yes. This is Dr. Grab. I have just advised a patient—Mr. ——, to see you. He seems to have a little ear trouble that needs attention. He’ll stand for about $250.”
Thanks to the tip given by Dr. Grab the ear specialist is able to speedily locate and describe the trouble with which Mr. —— is afflicted. Dr. Flubdub names his fee at $250, collects it, and sends $125 to his worthy brother, Dr. Grab. It’s a case of two pluck one.
When opportunity offers Dr. Flubdub returns the favor by sending patients to Dr. Grab who, in turn divides the fee, and thus the medical mill is kept busy.
Some physicians are very bold in demanding a division of fees as if it were right, rather than a honorarium. There is a letter in a certain office in Chicago, preserved as an evidence of gall, in which the writer says, when suggesting that he can send the recipient a patient: