I write as a consultant rheumatologist involved in preparing medico-legal reports and also honorary librarian of an antiquarian collection of books on arthritis for the British Society of Rheumatology.


I recently purchased the 1882 book Concussion of the Spine by John Erichsen, surgeon to Queen Victoria. This was the Victorian age of the railway when accidents were very common and litigation was rife.



Erichsen stated that serious hardship is inflicted on medical men by the system of uselessly multiplying medical witnesses; much evil results from the court's lack of adequate scientific and technical knowledge; the court should be assisted by assessors of known skill and experience; such assessors should be appointed by the court and not the litigant; witnesses on both sides should meet to draw up a conjoined report before the trial, which should be submitted to the court.



Is this where Lord Woolf got his ideas? Plus ça change...



Malcolm Jayson, Manchester