Atti, Vol. LIV No. 1, 2025.
Original scientific paper
MEDICAL AND PHARMACEUTICAL MALPRACTICE IN ISTRIA IN THE EIGHTEENTH AND NINETEENTH CENTURIES. THE CASE OF THE APOTHECARYSURGEON MATTEO MITROVICH FROM UMAGO-UMAG
Rino Cigui
; Centro di Ricerche Storiche - Rovigno, Rovigno - Croazia
Abstract
In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the unlawful practice of medicine and
the lack of discipline amongst the medical and apothecary specialists had already
been so profoundly rooted that they posed one of the most pressing problems for
the health services. In fact, the medical and pharmaceutical practice took place
within a wide spectrum of illegality, and its illicit exercise was further aggravated by
the collusion between the self-proclaimed surgeons and apothecaries who acted
in their own self-interest to the detriment of public health. Another destabilizing
factor were huge difficulties, especially for small communes, in finding the doctors
willing to accept a job offer, since not all the towns and villages had sufficient funds
to pay for their salaries. It is therefore hardly surprising that the lack of healthcare
personnel in the centres of the peninsula opened the doors to the abusive practice
of the profession by individuals who passed themselves off as doctors, as well as
doctors who held an inadequate and undeserved licence to practice.
Keywords
Istria, illegal practice, medicine, pharmacy, Matteo Mitrovich, Umago-Umag, XVIIIXIX centuries
Hrčak ID:
332131
URI
Publication date:
16.6.2025.
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