SURGEONS' COLLEGE

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 192, 7 April 1932, Page 6

SURGEONS' COLLEGE

ONE BODY PROPOSED FOR NEW ZEALAND AND AUSTRALIA. PERCENTAGE OF PASSES. The provision of a College of Surgeons for Australia and New Zealand, a fellowship in which would be a hallmark of competence and repute, was one of the purposes of the establishment of the Royal Australian College of Surgeons, explained Dr. P; Stanley Foster on his return to Christchurch from the fifth annual conference of the college, which recently received its Royal Charter. Dr. Foster and Sir Louis Barnett were the only New Zealand representatives at the conference. The proposal to form such a college had originally come from Sir Louis Barnett, who had first thought of making provision for New Zealand alone, but it had been decided that the Domhron was too small to support it.

Apart from the ordinary business of the conference there had been some excellent demonstrations in all branches of surgery, said Dr. Foster. All the Australian States had been well represented, but there had been only two delegates from New .Zealand. Dr. Foster and himself went to Melbourne partly because he had been invited -o address the conference. The Australian medical students at the universities of Sydney and Melbourne had an advantage in that, be:ng at larger centres, there was more material for clinical study. The' facilities in the actual medical schools at Otago were very good indeed, but there was the disadvantage of smaller ^population — Dunedin had one of tlie smaller hospitals of the Dominion. This was be4ng overcome in later years by the fact that the final stages of the course were being done in. the larger hospitals of the Dominion, where there was more clinical material available. But in sum the teaching in all thr-:e universities was of a very "h'.gh standard. One thing that the Royal Australian College of Surgeons had achieved was to have provision made so that the primary examination in anatomy and physiology for the F.R.C.S. was takcn in Melbourne last year. In the past it had been necessary for New Zealanders and Australians to go to London before they could take it, and spend a year on thesev subjects, which they could very well take while doing their course at the university. While the English students averaged 25 to 30 per cent, passes, at the recent examination at Melbourne 50 per cent. had .passed. The English authorities always acknowledged that better results came from the New Zealand and Australian men than from their own students. The next primary exanr'nation of this nature was proposed for 1934, and would possibly be held in both Melbourne and Dune-