Women In Medicine 1500 - 1900

To what extent did male medical practitioners succeed in excluding women from medicine in the years 1500 - 1930?

The simple answer to the above question would have to be that at the professional university trained medical level the male medical practitioners succeeded very successfully in the main in excluding women from medicine throughout the majority of this period. But by taking a look on the other side of the medical coin, and analysing the empirical as opposed to the learned side of medical practice. And in-particular the non-professional female medical practitioners such as 'wise women' and the midwives of the early modern period we see that male medical practitioners were on the whole fairly un-successful in excluding women. This essay will tease out these points into a more detailed answer by putting flesh on the bones set out above. It would not be in point of fact until the later part of the 19th century that women would start to emerge into the male dominated professional university or medical school trained medical profession in their own right. Even then they were only accepted by the vast majority of their male colleagues rather grudgingly at best. It had not in fact been until the very early 1800's (thanks to the control of what we could describe as the old boy network of medical and educational practice) that women were even permitted access to study in any subject, let alone medicine, at most universities. Or as Roy Porter describes it 'this clubby, chummy male monopoly' (Porter, 1997, p.356). The rather dodgy rationale used at the time for keeping women out of universities was that in the opinion of most men of the time; [.] young ladies were gynaecologically and psychologically unfit for higher education; dominated by her ovaries, a woman's place was in the home as wife and mother. Over exercise of the brain would divert energy from the womb and lead to sterility and hysteria - and anyway, with its blood and guts, medicine was no profession for ladies (Porter, 2007, pp. 356 - 357). Learned Medicine during the early modern to the 19th century was far from being the medical practice of choice for most people. Throughout most of this time period it was unusual for people to seek medical advice and treatment from a wide range of medical practitioners. This ranged from learned physicians to wise women and nuns. It should be noted that male university trained physicians were very much in the minority when it came to the choice people had to advice and treat their ailments. This medical pluralism meant that women in this period were in many respects at the forefront of medical care. This despite the many discriminations that they must have come up against from the male dominated medical elite. One of the ways this discrimination showed itself was through medical licencing. Theoretically throughout Europe various systems of officially licencing medical practitioners existed. With anyone practicing any form of medicine supposedly licenced to practice. In England for example the usual licencing authorities were the trade guilds. Now because women were neither permitted membership of the existing guilds and because were barred from setting up their own guilds a massive problem occurred in regards to how they could get themselves licenced. In the case of midwifes for example, they would have to apply for a licence from a church bishop. Or alternatively to a municipal authority, or even to the crown itself. Finding a way through this administrative red tape meant that in reality most female medical practices were carried out by women who were unlicensed. One of the most (if not particularly well known) certainly most well recorded female empirical healers was Lady Grace Mildmay. Born in 1552 into the landed elite of England, Lady Mildmay who died in 1620, left behind a vast tract of documents including medical notes. Although as a woman she was barred from completing university training to become a fully-fledged physician, she was perhaps as well read and versed in the physician's art and practice as her male counterparts. Indeed in some cases she was arguably even better read and learned on the subject than her male counterparts. Mildmay not only treated patients ailments (usually those of the the poor) she also researched in great depth into the causes and treatments of diseases. Like her male counterparts of the time she practiced the Galanic tradition of keeping the bodies humours in balance. She also though had a vast knowledge of the newer Paracelsian chemical medicine. One of the sources of evidence we have for Lady Mildmays' obvious knowledge and prowess as a medical practitioner comes from a paper she wrote on the subject of headaches. In this paper she described three types of headaches, their causes and their treatments. We can see how well read she is on the subject from her liberal use of learned medical terms like cephalgia, cephalia and himecrania to describe the three headache types (Elmer & Grell, 2004, pp. 35-36). As far as evidence of the existence of other female healers is concerned, if we take London for example, the papers of the London College of Physicians show the records of women who were prosecuted for practicing without a licence. Unlike Lady Mildmay most of these women came from the lower echelons of society. They used simple herbal remedies passed down from mother to daughter and also circulated by word of mouth. A form of communication used because the majority of these women could not read or write. During the early modern period one area where women medical practioners definitely dominated over male physicians was in the areas of pregnancy and childbirth. After the actual physical act of conception had taken place the males part in the proceedings - be it the husband or the physician - became negligible. Men were in all reality barred from having an active role in any further stages of the pregnancy or of the actual birth process. Here the Midwife and a complex tradition of ritual held sway. Rituals such as the preparation of the lying in chamber, which would be darkened, made to feel womb like and a place from where all men were banished. The only time that a male medical practitioner would play any part in these proceedings would have been if a serious problem had occurred such as the death of the foetus during the pregnancy or a mother or baby dying during childbirth. In which case the surgeon would be called in to use their tools to extract the baby from the mother's womb. In her own time period Lady Grace Mildmay could be loosely described as being almost a de-facto unofficial physician. It would not be until the nineteenth century though that the minority stranglehold of male medical practitioners on the learned university based official medical elite would start to be gradually released. By the eighteenth century some small steps into the male dominance were being made with a small percentage of women operating as doctresses and surgeonesses, having received training similar to their male counterparts. It was only once university training for all ranks of the male medical profession became formalised in the early nineteenth century and the bar was lifted on women attending university that women were able to join the medical profession as professional medics, in other words as doctors. Many excuses were given by male practitioners for the bar on women going to university to study medicine (and anything else for that matter). Most excuses being based around the idea that a woman's place was in the home and what they would witness both in training and later on when practicing as fully qualified medics would upset their delicate minds and constitutions because of the idea that women were the weaker sex. For example, writing in 1828 Michael Ryan a physician who practiced in London made the following points; 'The character of a woman mind is chiefly determined by the part she bears in relation to generation.' And 'The constitution is more feeble' (Brunton (ed) 2004, pp. 115-116). In essence Ryan like many other men of the time saw women as being feeble bodied and mind breeding machines, who lacked the ability both mentally and physically to join the ranks of the male medical fraternity. Although saying this women were considered most suitable for what was considered the lesser part of medical care that lesser part being nursing. This was because of the females alleged in-built caring and nurturing nature. It would be female pioneers that were not only strong in thought and deed, but also determined that would start to break through this male dominated and controlled barrier to becoming female medics equal to their male colleagues. Pioneering woman such as Elizabeth Blackwell and Mary Murdoch. In 1858 Elizabeth Blackwell was the first woman to be registered with the General Medical Council in Britain. She was a British born woman living in America who had trained and graduated from Geneva College in New York State in 1849, and therefore not trained in a British or European university (Brunton (ed) 2004, p. 119). It was a small start, but it was a start. Mary Murdoch was one of the first women to graduate in 1892 as a doctor from a British medical school The London Medical School for Women (Brunton (ed) 2004, p. 122). Male practitioners in Britain attempted to continue the status quo of male dominance of the professional medical world by closing the loophole that allowed a female with a medical qualification from another country such as Elizabeth Blackwell to be permitted membership to the British Medical Association after Elizabeth Blackwell This state of affairs could only ever be a temporary thing though and their efforts ultimately failed Even after the doors to the universities and medical schools began to be opened to women though they still faced major problems being accepted into them. One of the biggest problem being most womens lack of general education. What little general education they may have received usually came short of the basic levels expected for enrolment in the universities and medical schools. Therefore even though the doors were now partially opened male dominance of them continued to a certain extent. This inequality in education was again justified by physiology. Women's bodies were thought to be particularly at risk of damage during and just after puberty. Energy expanded at this time on education would cause menstrual disorders and ultimately sterility, leaving women 'unsexed' and therefore unfit for marriage and domestic life (Rhodes, 2004, p. 156). This analysis clearly being a complete load of tosh, without a shred of evidence to back it up. Earlier historians have argued that World War One was the real turning point for women in medicine and for ending the male dominance of the profession. And that it was in fact a watershed for women as a whole. Maxine Rhodes though points out that although the war certainly gave the medical schools a temporary incentive to open their doors to more females candidates because of the drop in male candidates due to the call up to the armed services by the end of the war many of the schools of medicine that had opened their doors to women during the war quickly closed them and set limits on female students (Rhodes, 2004, p.162). The conclusion must therefore be that the answer to the original question is that for the majority of the period between 1500 and 1930 there was a strong male professional medical conspiracy in place designed to give an impression of male dominance of professional medicine. Which was designed predominately to exclude women (and most other empirical healers) from the professional medical ranks as physicians and doctors. This conspiracy was carried out by a male-centric policy of excluding women from the universities and later the medical schools. This was done despite the almost irrefutable fact that as we have seen women during the early modern period in particular dominated in many areas of medicine. Women did eventually break through this conspiracy of male dominance and begin to end their exclusion from professional medicine in the later nineteenth century. But even then still faced discrimination and distrust from their male counterparts, which continued well into the twentieth century. 2020 words.

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Foster, M. 1984, 'Significant Sisters. The Grassroots of Active Feminism.' In Brunton, D. (ed) 2004, Health Disease and Society in Europe 1800 - 1930. (Source 6.3) Manchester. Manchester University Press.

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Porter, R. (1999) the Greatest Benefit to Mankind. London, Fontana

Rhodes, M. 2004, 'Women in Medicine: Doctors and Nurses 1850 - 1920'. In Brunton, D. (ed) Medicine Transformed: Health Disease and Society in Europe 1800 - 1930. Manchester. Manchester University Press. And Milton Keynes. The Open University.

Ryan, M. 1986, 'A Manual of Midwifery, in Women from Birth to Death. The Female Life Cycle in Britain 1830 - 1914'. In Brunton, D. (ed) 2004, Health Disease and Society in Europe 1800 - 1930. (Source 6.1) Manchester. Manchester University Press.