ABSTRACT

The current representative, trades union, body for the medical profession, the British Medical Association, was created in 1832. The regulatory arm of the medical profession, the General Medical Council,1 was established 26 years later by the Medical Regulation Act 1858.This Act has been described as ‘a landmark in the development of the modern medical profession’2 and crucial for the establishment of medicine as a single influential profession. It brought together previously diverse groups into a single formalized profession and focused its self-regulatory power through the General Medical Council.3 From its inception, the GMC has been funded by its registered members. Prior to this there was no reliable means for the public to differentiate between trained doctors and ‘quacks’. It has been estimated that almost one third of practitioners in the early 1840s had no medical qualifications.4