ABSTRACT
Slaughter's 'Impaired Doctors' Committee' goes on to debate the balance between the doctor's right to practise and the right of the community to be protected against dangerous individuals. Unlike medical sadists and physicians with organic dementia, who are rare both in real life and in literature, doctors suffering from drug or alcohol abuse are common. In general, writers treat addicted doctors with a great deal of sympathy. The alleged offender immediately attains a degree of collegiate sympathy while the exposure of an incompetent or an alcoholic doctor is perceived as detrimental to the entire profession. Urbino's son, Dr Juvenal Urbino, the principal character in Love in the Time of Cholera is favoured with a sudden and more bizarre death. Past illnesses, provided the doctor has fully recovered from them, may indeed give him additional insights into a particular disease, its symptoms and its course.
