A Respectable Occupation: - University of Hertfordshire Research ...

ut other kinds of partnership seldom existed and 88 per cent of surgeon-
apothecaries were sole practitioners. 151
As far as their income was concerned, there was a wide variation in
the amounts earned by the general practitioners and it seems to have been
related to a number of factors. These included the geographical location, the
practitioner‘s skill both in terms of medicine and commercialism, and the
period during which he was in practice. From 1700 to 1800, the population
increased steadily and this expanded the patient base for the medical
profession. 152 Not only could the pre-eminent physicians enjoy large
incomes, but the surgeon-apothecary could also do very well, providing he
adopted a vigorous commercial approach to his business. 153
At that time, an apothecary‘s income came solely from the sale of
medicines, which, as a consequence, were presented in small quantities,
individually itemised on the account. Loudon provides the following
example, ―One family had been supplied in 1754 with medicine delivered
daily … including Sundays … totalling 687 items plus seven bleedings and
two blisters. The bill came to £154 5s 7½.‖ 154 But he goes on to say that
their incomes declined during the early part of the nineteenth century as a
result of the increasing expense of obtaining a medical training, the
competition in the dispensing arena posed by the chemists and druggists
and the increased availability of licensed doctors after the passing of the
151 Lane, „The Medical Practitioners of Provincial England in 1783‟, 364.
152 Digby, Making a Medical Living, p. 40.
153 Loudon, „The Nature of Provincial Medical Practice in Eighteenth Century England‟, 28.
154 Loudon, „The Nature of Provincial Medical Practice in Eighteenth Century England‟, 24-25.
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