Medical Jurisprudence, Forensic medicine and Toxicology. Vol. 1

by R. A. Witthaus; Tracy C. Becker

WHICH REGULATE

THE ACQUIREMENT OF THE RIGHT TO PRACTISE MEDICINE AND SURGERY IN THE UNITED STATES, GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND, AND THE CANADIAN PROVINCES.

[Note.—This synopsis is designed to contain especially those provisions of the statutes which regulate the right to practise medicine and surgery. It is not intended to include provisions regulating apothecaries, druggists, chemists, and dentists, or the sale of drugs, medicines, and poisons; nor provisions for the organization and procedure of boards of medical examiners, except so far as they regulate the requirements demanded from applicants for permission to practise; nor provisions with reference to the duties of clerks or registrars in the preparation and safe-keeping of records in their care; nor those defining the duties of members of boards, and punishing the misconduct of such members; nor those prescribing qualifications for appointment to the public medical service; nor former laws not now applicable to candidates; nor regulations of the form of certificates or licenses, where the issuing of them is committed to some public functionary or body; nor provisions with reference to the powers and disabilities of local institutions to confer diplomas or degrees, nor with reference to medical students except as candidates for admission to practise. In the synopsis words of the masculine gender are uniformly used except when the law by its terms makes a distinction between men and women, in which case the distinction is indicated.]

Alabama.

Qualification.—The board of censors of the Medical Association of the State of Alabama and the board of censors of the county medical societies in affiliation with the said association are boards of medical examiners (Code 1887, s. 1,301). In the absence of such board of medical examiners in any county, the county commissioners may establish a board of from three to seven physicians of good standing, resident in the county, whose authority shall terminate whenever a board is organized in accordance with the constitution of and in affiliation with said association (ib., s. 1,296). Where the board of examiners is constituted as provided in sec. 1,296, it must issue a license to practise medicine in any one or more of its branches in the county, if on examination the applicant is found duly qualified, and is of good moral character (ib., s. 1,297).

In a county having only the medical board provided for in sec. 1,296, a regular graduate of a medical college in the United States, having a diploma, is entitled to practise medicine without a license, upon recording his diploma in the office of the judge of probate of the county (ib., s. 1,298).

A license issued by the last-mentioned board must be recorded in the office of the judge of probate of the county (ib., s. 1,299). The license or diploma, after record, is evidence of authority; if the original be lost, a certified copy of the record is sufficient evidence (ib., s. 1,300). Without a certificate of qualification from the board provided for in sec. 1,301, except as above provided, no person can lawfully practise medicine in any of its branches or departments as a profession or means of livelihood (ib., s. 1,302). The standard of qualification, method or system, and subjects of examination are prescribed by the medical association of the State (ib., s. 1,303).

The board of medical examiners, on application, must examine an applicant for a certificate of qualification as a practitioner of medicine, and if he be found qualified, and of good moral character must issue a certificate (ib., s. 1,304).

Physicians having a license as above before the organization in a county of a board, are on application thereto entitled to a certificate without examination and to be registered as licensed practitioners of medicine (ib., s. 1,305).

The certificate is a license throughout the State. It must be recorded in the office of the judge of probate of the county in which the person resides at the time of issue. Upon recording it, the judge must indorse a certificate of record and sign it and affix the seal of the court (ib., s. 1,306). Such certificate, or, if lost, a certified copy of the record, is evidence (ib., s. 1,307).