Milford chronicle., 1956-04-13
Physicians, Lawyers
Hold Symposium

d0lu Symposium
Two hundred Delaware physi-
clans and lawyers met Sunday in
the Du Barry Room of Whining
lton's Hotel DUPONT for this states
first Medical-Legal Symposium.
The meeting, co-sponsored by the
Delaware Academy of Medicine, the
Delaware Bar Association and the
Medical Society of Delaware, was
arranged as an effort toward fur
thering cooperation between the
medical and legal professions. Or.
Victor d. Washburn, chairman of
the committee on arrangements for
the conference commented Our
problem is not TO determine whe-
ther medicine and law can work
together, but rather how best they
can cooperate in the discharge of
their obligations to Society"
Recognizing tn 1T Workmen's
Compensation cases, disability
problems and an increasing num-
ber of civil claims with medical
overtones are constantly bringing
the two professions into contact
with each other. the Symposium
was aimed at creating an under
standing by individuals of eacn
profession of the problems of the
other. The Hon. John Biggs, Jr.,
Chief Judge of the United States
Court of Appeals for the Third
Circuit, Samuel B. Madden, M d.
associate professor at the Uni
versity of Pennsylvania School Cf
Medicine, and Samuel Polsky, Pm,
D., director of the Philadelphia
Medico-Legal Institute, spoke at
the morning session which was
followed in the afternoon by a
panel discussion of problems of
special significance in Delaware,
moderated by Judge Daniel L.
Herman.
Judge Riggs, opening the pro-
gram, pointed to the doctor as the
physician to the individuals OF a
state. and to the lawyer as the
physician to the state itself. In
view of the expected increase OF
64 million people in this country
by 1875, with an accompanying in
crease in the problems OF drug
addiction, motor vehicle accidents.
criminal insanity, etc, it is nee
essary, said the judge, for medl-
cine and law to work together TO
expedite justice in these cases, and
to contribute to the social as well
as the physical health of the COM
munity. Looking ahead, Judge
Biggs said, II can foresee a time
when the community, with the aid
of the medical and legal profes-
sions viii be able to devise pre-
ventive statutes statutes which,
constitutionally, may permit the
discovery of the abnormal indi-
vidual at an early age and require
his treat;1snt before he can be-
comss an actual social danger"
DR. Ss4muel Hadden, a psychia-
trist, sgressed in his talk the fact
that the problems of doctors and
lawverg in cases of justice are ba-
sical,y adjective points of medi-
cine aud of law, but that the hui
man factor arising in the neces-
sity for proving or disproving
point too often obscures the SIM
plicity of the problem. Our meth
cd of trial, DR.. Hadden observed, is
the advocate system, in which two
men who believe in opposite side
of ease each try to prove one
side at the expense of the other
Thus, there can be no trial without
a difference of opinion. DR.. Had
den told his audience that the diff
ficulties of legal medicine arise
from this difference of opinion.
Just as there are differences of
legal opinion, there are differences
of medical opinion, and the same
case may not carry the same mean
ing to each of several well-quali-
fed observers. The great prob
lem confronting law and medicine,
he said, is the devising of methods
for putting such differences on an
objective basis, so that society may
benefit from more sure admins
tration of justice.
DR.. Samuel Polsky, director of
Philadelphia Medico-Legal Insti-
tue traced the development of a
common ground between the pro-
fessions of law and medicine
through the search for truth. Cit
ing the history of efforts toward
medico-legal cooperation from 5000
B. c., Or. Polsky observed that the
chief difficulty in these attempts
has been in knowing where to be-
gin The three possible entries to
the field, he said, are the profess
sional, the educational, and the re-
search methods. Citing the pres
ent Symposium as an example of
the professional method, Dr. Pol
sky stressed the need for each
group to be educated in the needs