Fifty years ago

The hippocratic oath

BMJ 1998; 317 doi: 10.1136/bmj.317.7166.1110b (Published 24 October 1998)
Cite this as: BMJ 1998;317:1110.3

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The attempt of the World Medical Association to draft a pledge which can be adopted by medical men and women as a short code of ethics has given some publicity to the Hippocratic Oath and also to the mistaken idea that this Oath is sworn to by the newly qualified doctor. It is reproduced invery few histories of medicine, and so we print below the translation of the Pagan Oath given by Mr. W. H. S. Jones in his book The Doctor's Oath (Cambridge University Press, 1924).There are other versions …

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