Bourne Medical Club

One of the most important of the self-help groups that became popular in England after the passing of the Poor Law Amendment Act in 1834 was Bourne (Self-Aiding) Medical Club. It was established in 1841 and soon had 2,500 members, men, women and children residing within ten miles of the town who, for small annual payments, were provided with medical and surgical assistance when required.

The aims, objects, administration and success of the club was outlined in a report which appeared in the Stamford Mercury on Friday 26th March 1858 when it was already 17 years old:

A special meeting of the committee was held in the Town Hall on the 5th to receive the report of the secretary on the situation which has attended the effort already made to obtain additional honorary subscriptions; it having been shown, at a previous quarterly meeting, that the addition of at least £38 a year is required to support this valuable charity on the footing which it has hitherto maintained.

The accounts furnished by the stewards of those parishes in which the attempt has been made was very encouraging, and confirms the hope expressed at the former meeting that, if the exertion be used by the stewards generally, the requisite amount of annual subscriptions may be raised, and the necessity of reducing or even restricting the number of recipient members be prevented. The estimation in which the charity is held by those who partake of it is shown by the progressive increase of their number (now amounting to more than 2,809), and by the fact that many more are anxious to be admitted.

On the 20th of May the club will have been in operation 17 years, having been formed in 1841. It is therefore one of those local institutions for the benefit of the labouring class which has stood the test of time and experience, and the advantages of which, if withdrawn, would be much missed by them. Surely, therefore, the owners and occupiers of land and other residents in the district, to whom an appeal is now made will not suffer its benefits to be lost to the neighbourhood for want of those trifling contributions which in general, will be amply sufficient to ensure their continuance.

With the exception of those who receive permanent parochial relief (for whom medicine and attendance are provided by the Union), the club is open to all labourers in agriculture and trade and their families, and to servants whose wages do not exceed £6 a year. The members pay quarterly in advance a stated sum, which is received by the medical attendants (whom they choose for the year), with a fixed addition supplied out of the fund raised by the honorary subscriptions. A single individual pays 3s. a year or 9d. quarterly, for whom the medical man receives 4s. a year. A married man and his wife pay each 2s. a year or 6d. quarterly and 1s. a year or 3d. quarterly for each child up to five; for any above that number they pay nothing, but are nevertheless entitled to medicine and attendance for them, the surgeon being paid out of the funds of the club. Thus a man with a wife and five children pays 9s. a year or 2s. 3d. quarterly, and the surgeon receives for the family 13s. 6d. a year. Besides this, a wife by paying 6d. in advance can secure to herself attendance in her confinement, the remainder of the surgeon’s fee being made up from the fund.

There are also other minor benefits, which it is not necessary to particulate. In order to ensure due attention to the member in extraordinary cases of accident or protracted disease an extra remuneration has occasionally been given to the surgeon, when the state of the funds has admitted of it: but in such cases it would be better that admission should be obtained for the patient into the Stamford Infirmary. The regulations for the club are found to work beneficially in various ways. The surgeon not being remunerated by a fixed stipend, but according to the number of members who select him, and they being at liberty to change their medical attendant every year, these together must tend to ensure attention on the one side and satisfaction on the other.

Another recommendations is this, that it is quite as much to the interest of the medical man as of the patient that application be made to him in the earliest stage of a disorder, for then less medicine and attendance will probably effect a cure, and at the same time a long suspension of the patients’ earnings to be avoided. There is also another advantage to be noticed. In the labouring class we find generally a disposition to postpone as long as possible an application to a medical man in the illness of the wife or the children from a prudent dread of the expense, and from this delay serious consequences not infrequently result. The members of this club on the contrary are encouraged by their medical attendants to seek advice and medicine, without hesitation, on the first appearance of a disorder; whereby much suffering is often avoided, and the seeds of some serious malady prevented taking root in the system; so that among the beneficial effects of the club may be reckoned not only the cure or relief, but the actual prevention of much suffering, especially in the cases of the wives and young children.

In common with other measures for improving the condition of the labouring class, this club may be expected to have a good effect in teaching them the wisdom, comfort, and economy of making a timely provision against the probably evils and waste to which they are liable. It will help to show them that this is done best and most cheaply by small periodical payments in anticipation of them, and at times when they are best able to make them. That the club is generally acceptable to the medical profession in the neighbourhood is proved by the fact that, with scarcely an exception, all the surgeons in the district have connected themselves with it and that the expense of its management is defrayed by a percentage on their accounts.

The club continued in existence until well into the 20th century and records show that it operated from premises in West Street where the honorary secretary from 1882-1904 was Leslie F Evans. It is evident that this organisation fulfilled a real need in the community and was beneficial both to patients and doctors with a scheme that became the forerunner of the panel patient system which operated until the arrival of the National Health Service, the publicly funded health care system, in 1948 and has now become an integral part of everyday life.

NOTE: The money amounts quoted are in pre-decimal currency which was in use
at that time with 12 pennies to the shilling and 20 shillings to the £.

See also     Bourne United Provident Association     Health care in Bourne