PILLS—BILLS

NZ Truth, Issue 1186, 23 August 1928, Page 6

PILLS— BILLS

Why Should Your Doctor Wait? _ Who pays the doctor's grocery bill, petrol account and household oharges, when we fail to pay his fees?-. Does some beneficent Providence open the heavens, showering food and raiment upon the dwelling places of medical men — or. what? JT is remarkable, this complaisant demeanor of ours, m respect of our doctor's bills. "H-m—'frald he'll have to wait a While," is the general attitude when a green-stamped envelope, hurriedly addressed with a series of professional hieroglyphics we know so well, arrives through the mail and 1b immediately tucked away at the bottom of the drawer. T Now, is that fair? Not a few of us have known the occasion when — at two o'clock m the morning-^-we dashed round to the doctor's residence, implored him to tend a sick relative or superintend the arrival of little Annie, and sometimes when the illness was not of any real moment. . This last' may have happened on three successive nights — and on each occasion we looked to the harassed doctor for advice and skill. ' Yet, when we receive his account one month — maybe three months— later, vre consider by some inexplicable method of reasoning that doctors haye plenty of money and can afford to wait, y Is that the reason why so many doctors nowadays are conducting their professional affairs m. a manner far removed from those In evidence fifty, or. even less years ago? Without offence, may it be said that owing to, shall we say, competition among medical practitioners, they are not now able to place such stress upon their philanthropy as were their predecessors In the • more unhurried times of the eighties? By that, one must not infer that medical men do not gracefully render many gratuitous services and without any flourishing of brasses, for they do give many an uplifting grip of the hand to those sadly m need. l QUAINT ARGUMENT There is a deal of loose talk about doctors being "mercenary," "tightfisted," etc., but if that has been' the experience of some people, it may be urged that, theirs is the fault, that . theirs is the door at which the root cause should be laid. And if doctors are not allowing as much latitude , In the matter of fees and the payment thereof, it is because they have, m a number of cases, been wellrnigh driven . to take legal action through the attitude adopted by the very people whom they succoured." By a* further quaint process of argument, the public appears to have treated the subject of delay In meeting medical bills as part of an Inherent tradition, to which the tolerant viewpoint of physicians and surgeons have themselves subscribed; that despite the needs of human flesh, m face of . heavy personal expenditure, a doctor's brass-plate connotes a bottomless well of money-power, an inexhaustible pit which 'does not need replenishing. Medicoes have many outgoing expenses peculiar to their profession, and, whereas at one time the i physician was known — -and, likely __ enough, recommended — by the condition and contents of his little bfack bag, so now is he recog-. nized, and, maybe, his professional altitude Tguage.d, by the car m which he drives to your home. If he is good enough to focus his skill and knowledge upon your hurts and ailments, are you making an equitable contribution to the contract by calling upon him to wait twelve months for his remuneration? * Would your tradesmen wait as long - — the grocer/ the butcher, the coalman? And would you expect them to wait? Why, then, the doctor?