by Alisa Mantall

Created on: April 06, 2007   Last Updated: October 14, 2011

Founding the American Medical Association (AMA) - 1847:  The American Medical Association (AMA) is the largest association of doctors in the United States. It was founded in 1847. It began from a group of doctors established at the University of Pennsylvania including Nathan Smith Davis and other doctors from within the University of Pennsylvania. This particular group held a meeting on the standards of medical education. Invitations were extended to other such groups across the country.

Although impractical to some, Davis and colleagues set forth to improve and elevate the standards of medical education in the United States. The founding meeting was held in a 2 day meeting in Pennsylvania in mid May of 1847. It was this meeting that formed the American Medical Association which contained 250 delegates from 28 states.

The two principal items of business for this convention were the establishment of a code of ethics and the creation of minimum requirements for medical education and training.

Adopting a code:

Thomas Percival, a physician, philosopher, and writer, published his Code of Medical Ethics. Percival's association with the Manchester Infirmary in England was significant in the drafting of his codes. The codes of conduct he introduced into publication were to be used at hospitals and charities. These guidelines were generally effective thus the AMA adopted Percival's codes of ethics on May 7, 1847.

It remained unchanged for years until they found more effective ways and the old codes needed to be amended. With discrepancies and hot tempers the first of several amendments had come to order. Updates in these codes have been made but the base of it still lays within the 1803 published Code of Medical Ethics written by Englishman, Thomas Percival, and is better described as "The American Medical Ethics Revolution."

Just getting started:

The AMA now in the real swing of things was seriously looking into the risks of medications and their effects on the public. Through the next few years they worked tediously to note the dangers on secret ingredients in medications not listed by the manufacturer. They began to patent medicine and list all ingredients involved in the manufacturing. They warned the public of dangers and went after drug companies to reveal their secret. Medications that weren't up to par to what they were supposed to be weren't allowed a patient.

It wasn't until 1858 that they formed a committee on ethics now called the Council on Ethical

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