History
Worcestershire Medico-Legal Society
Worcestershire Medico-Legal Society (WMLS) was originally formed in the mid-1980s by a small group including Tony Cole, Consultant Paediatrician; Eddie Crangle, Clerk to Worcester Magistrates; Jonathan Brew, Harrison Clark, Solicitors, and John Duddington, Head of the Law School at Worcester College of Technology. The society flourished for a time and attracted speakers such as David Napley. It lapsed in the 1990s but was revived in 2008.
Our objective has always been to cover not just medicine, as such, although this is obviously the main feature of our programme, but to look at health care in the light of social care and education too and to link these to contemporary legal issues. This reflects the current emphasis on, so far as possible, looking at these three services as an integrated whole. Thus our aim is to bring together lawyers and those health care professions to look at matters of common interest and to provide a place where members of these different disciplines can meet. We are also keen to involve students in our activities. All the talks aim to interest members of both the legal and health care professions, although inevitably some talks will lean more to the needs of one group than the other.
We work with the University of Worcester (UOW) and in 2015 we signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the UOW, committing WMLS and the UOW to working together, and we are looking forward to the establishment of a Medical School at the UOW which will be known as the Three Counties Medical School.
In 2019, the WMLS became registered as a charity with HMRC (ZD02089) which enables us to claim gift aid on subscriptions.
We also have links with other organisations in Worcestershire concerned with health and social care. WMLS is a member of the Reference and Engagement Group of Worcestershire Healthwatch which, to quote from its website, is the ‘independent consumer champion – giving the public, patients and users of health and social care services in Worcestershire a voice’. This means that we receive information about what is going on in health and social care in Worcestershire and can feed this back to our members. In addition, we have close links with the local branch of the British Association of Social Workers with which we have held a joint meeting on the topical subject of ‘Continuing Health Care’ and hope to have more.
Meetings were originally held at the Charles Hastings Education Centre at Worcestershire Royal Hospital, but then moved to the School of Law, UOW. This has enabled us to attract students as well as other members of the UOW to our meetings and is a most attractive and accessible venue in the heart of the city. In September 2023, the Three Counties Medical School is opening and we are holding several of our meetings in their building.