In recent months, there has been a lot of talk about Law 17/2009, of November 23, 2009, on free access to service activities and the exercise thereof (better known as the Omnibus Law, for the incorporation into Spanish law of the European Union's services directive). internship It is logical that this should be the case, since the implementation of this rule affects us all to a greater or lesser extent.

Let us hope that the new legal environment that will be set up will be a financial aid, and not a burden, simplifying administrative procedures, guaranteeing documentary security, facilitating communication between physicians and patients and, above all, increasing the freedoms of both.

Like the courage of the soldier, the Organización Médica Colegial (OMC) is supposed to have the skill to proceed in this matter with order and concert, involved, as it has been since its remote origins, in the complex official document of ordering the practice of the medical profession.

A seemingly inevitable consequence of the implementation of the new law is the modification of the statutes governing the operation of professional associations. The committee General de Colegios Oficiales de Médicos will have to adapt its statutes to the new requirements. Perhaps it would be enough to change a few articles to accommodate the modern and efficient management that, under the symbol of the "one-stop shop", the Omnibus Law intends to establish.

But wouldn't it be a good idea to take advantage of the occasion to bring modernity and efficiency to many other chapters of the statutes that govern the functioning of committee
General? It is worth remembering that in a couple of months it will be 30 years since its promulgation and, admittedly, some branches have withered on this sturdy tree. Along with careful pruning, a no less careful grafting work is needed, so that vigorous branches can sprout from the rooted trunk.

It is, for example, important and urgent to implement a new disciplinary regime in the collegiate statutes, which will be the backbone of the future deontological management of the medical profession. Fortunately, it seems that work is already underway to update the Code of Ethics and Medical Deontology, which has been in force since 1999.

It should not be forgotten, however, that without solid statutory backing, a code of ethics risks becoming a weak document, a mere inventory of advice and exhortations that can be ignored with impunity.

A joyful lesson

In 1919 William Osler was 70 years old. To congratulate him, some colleagues and former disciples wrote down some memories that they published in the July issue of the Bulletin of the Johns Hopkins Hospital.

This is precisely where the following anecdote appears. Henry H. Hurd tells us that, at the 1883 annual meeting of the Canadian Medical Association association , a very prominent physician read a communication on the conduct of physicians towards their colleagues, in which they advocated unheard-of behavior: they argued that it was legitimate to appropriate the patients of others, that it was decent to use the press to tell the public about their daring operations and their therapeutic prowess, and other things of the sort.

When he finished his speech, several bystanders questioned him and recommended that he consult what the code of ethics in force at the time said about relations between physicians. He replied that he had never seen such a code and that, moreover, he did not care what the document might say, it meant nothing to him.

Then Osler, young at the time, but already loaded with prestige, jumped to his feet, took out of his pocket a copy of the code of ethics, waved it aloud, and in a clear and cordial, but firm voice, said that it was a great pleasure for him to submit the booklet to that fellow, lacking guide, although innocent, for he was convinced that "he had sinned inadvertently and through ignorance."
In a clear and cordial, but firm voice

Much has happened since the distant 1883, but the anecdote retains its freshness and its characters continue to possess a vibrant topicality. Juan José Rodríguez Sendín, president of committee General de Colegios de Médicos, has been insisting lately -among other vital issues for the functioning of the collegiate corporation- on the need to increase acceptance among the members of the association of the rules that regulate professional practice from within.

The President of the WTO is obviously not referring to the legal and administrative rules that come to us from outside, which are imposed on us by their own coercive force. He does, however, refer to home-grown ethical and deontological rules, those generated in the cultivation of the internal ethos of the medical profession.

The new version of code of ethics must have a series of characteristics: it must convince the profession; it must present the image of skill and service, of independence and seriousness, in which a good member would draw his ethical self-portrait; it must make it improbable, due to its ethical robustness, that some doctors could not care less about it, that it means nothing to them.

The new version of the code that will regulate the medical profession has to convince patients as well, because it tries to emulate the image of respect and humanity that ordinary patients want to see in the physicians who treat them.

A code of ethics with these characteristics could not be ignored, let alone underestimated, by physicians.

We need those responsible for drafting the draft and approve the final text of the future code of ethics to speak to us in a clear and cordial but firm voice about the ethical principles and rules that should inspire and guide the professional conduct of physicians and shape the human environment of the health centers and hospitals of our National Health System.