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[Raveline]

I've got two problem with doctors :

1°) First of all, they are useless most of the time. They only work when your dwarves are injured. And thanks to OCD, I want my number of iddlers to be as low as possible.

2°) Since the new release, it's very rare to get talented medics coming to your fort. Even before, it was hard to get them to have good skills without having to harm voluntarily your dwarves (not that I object to this, but it means painful micromanagement that I don't really like).

I don't know if it's planned, but there should be some not-too-complex ways of improving this situation :

- Dwarves could go to the doctor for other reasons than serious injuries. They could have medical check-ups, that would improve the diagnostician skill ; they could have small scratches that would need small stitching, training this skill ; and let's not forget about taking care of animals, which would allow to practice surgery and "bone-doctoring" without risking to need more coffins for your dwarves. Of course, diseases could be added, but that would make thing much more complex.

- For the more sadistic players, it could be nice to have their doctors be allowed to "experiment" on trapped animals or goblins. (Or at least practice dissection on corpses, as they did in antiquity and middle-age, so they would get better in all medical skills).

- It would be nice if there could be some "quarantine", particularly for migrants. You know, like, trying to see if one of your new dwarves do not have curiously long canines and a curious pale skin. Once again, that would put the doctor to good use and would improve the diagnostician skill. (Though I reckon this would a bit more difficult to code than the previous idea). And of course, bad diagnostician would not spot vampires.

- And lastly, having the doctors be mortitian and preparing the corpses before burial would be nice. (Of course, this would NOT be their priority in case of urgent surgery !).

I understand there are still many bugs with doctors and hospital, so I imagine the system must be quite complex, but that would be some nice additions to the game.

[NTJedi]

I agree doctors need other methods of raising their skills... even if it means testing on corpses and animals.

[Icefire2314]

I like this idea overall.

[King Mir]

Seems kinda gamey. If doctor training is to be improved, I think the first motivation should be realism, not the dissimilarity to other easy to train professions in the game.

[Wolfy]

I'd love for check ups so you can see how pepole are doing, I'd also like doctors use more items like plants to fix things (last I check they dont)

[Azure]

It would be nice if doctors could skill up by experimenting on corpses like real life med students but until then we got our drop shaft being fed a continuous stream of migrants for five years until they earn the "Right" to join dwarven society. Bam! Covered your need for training, and quarantine. Gotta love burrow designations. Use Garbage dumps to drop food and supplies in for your medical team & their guards. Volunteer a few migrants to take care of turkeys or farm.

[!!Urist Unfortune!!]

Yeah check ups would be nice, anything to keep those doctors bussy, im a lil OCD about that too. i end up asigning them new jobs, but then u have to go back and unasign them when someone gets hurt. and it just ends up being a pain. and Urist Golbin fodder dies of infection cuzz the doctor is hauling refuse instead.

[Reudh]

I would think that they need:

• Poultices made from herbs that can increase/decrease efficacy of healing, remove toxins, pain relief.
• Any doctor that has a doctoring labour needs it to be of the highest priority besides immediate survival (drink, food, fleeing from evils) - a doctor should be prepared to work when tired, but they have a higher fail rate.
• A doctor should either only work with corpses or only with live patients by default, but this could be overridden, providing more utility/faster training at the cost of higher infection risk.
• Certain activities the doctor partakes in spare time can modify success/failure rates or infection rates. Things involving battle, butchery, cooking, and similar increase risk of illness. Burying dead dwarves increases risk of illness. Certain jobs don't modify the risk (masonry, architecture, etc).
• Ideally doctors should be able to be (as I said) ordered to work on prisoners. These prisoners must be restrained, and maybe sedated with a herbal poultice, or any syndrome bearing material that causes both pain relief and unconsciousness. Depending on the prisoner's race, the dwarves should be able to research how their body works. Highly unethical, and could prompt a war, if enough prisoners are experimented on.
• Once a certain quota is fulfilled of a particular race (ie. 100 goblins experimented on) with the next caravan your civ will gain understanding and get a slight buff to combat against them. The danger of this is of course juggling the ethical questions of it, and how the civs react. Your own dwarves could be experimented upon as well, this would give a. the ability to dispose of unwanted migrants/uristmcfailures, b. training, c. higher success rates in subsequent operations.

[Neowulf]

Golf clubs- 2 or more doctors with no current work to do will go golfing, where they socialize and share expertise. The actual golfing job just has them walk around any convenient grass/moss covered area (or maybe a new zone type?)

Birth rates- If TV has taught me anything about the medical profession, it's that doctors are as promiscuous as rabbits. Every adult female dwarf should have a 5% chance per male doctor of getting pregnant, checked once per season.

[Raveline]

Anything to keep those doctors bussy, im a lil OCD about that too.

I know, right ?

Your own dwarves could be experimented upon as well, this would give a. the ability to dispose of unwanted migrants/uristmcfailures, b. training, c. higher success rates in subsequent operations.

Not sure about this (though, any moral consideration put on the side, that would give a way of making use of armless or legless dwarves). I'd think that would be to be reserved for when Toady will add the diseases, and would only be to experiment medication. Perhaps you could be given the choice to do it for other things, but it would create massive bad thoughts, and a bad reputation with the mountainhome.

Golf clubs- 2 or more doctors with no current work to do will go golfing, where they socialize and share expertise. The actual golfing job just has them walk around any convenient grass/moss covered area (or maybe a new zone type?)

Birth rates- If TV has taught me anything about the medical profession, it's that doctors are as promiscuous as rabbits. Every adult female dwarf should have a 5% chance per male doctor of getting pregnant, checked once per season.

The the golf idea is hilarious ("Hauling job / Caddies"). With the birthrate being what is right now, though, I really wouldn't want to have even more babies...

[CursedBurger]

I don't think doctors performing checkups and practicing on dolls is reasonably realistic for the period- my suggestions would be

1) dissecting animals or corpses for practice (another use for corpses besides butchering)
2) studying from texts
3) Helping with pregnancies / caesarian sections / fertility / that sort of thing

[Reudh]

Exactly, Raveline! The whole point of it would be weighing up whether it would be useful to you in the long run or not. If your mountainhome hates you to a certain point they'd refuse to trade, or perhaps even siege to stop dissecting their compatriots.
The dwarves who are resident should not see such a thing, so these doctors would be operating in a closed off part of the fort. Of course, if another dwarf finds out about it, s/he could get a bad thought varying from 'relatively bad' from seeing 'slaughter' to extremely bad (a friend/family/lover being dissected). A doctor found operating in such a way could be charged.

[Vattic]

I don't think doctors performing checkups and practicing on dolls is reasonably realistic for the period- my suggestions would be

1) dissecting animals or corpses for practice (another use for corpses besides butchering)
2) studying from texts
3) Helping with pregnancies / caesarian sections / fertility / that sort of thing

I mostly agree with you on this but would add one thing:
4) dealing with minor work / accident related injuries.

While performing most jobs dwarves should occasionally hurt themselves. There could be burns from furnace operating, cuts from most jobs, dwarves could accidentally drop things on their feet, trip over, and even fall down stairs (wasn't this once possible?).

These kind of injuries should provide a steady stream of work for your doctors but anything more serious should take priority.

[Z1000000m]

Im really into the idea of doctors helping with pregnancies and preparing the dead for burial.
One could also suggest that without medical help, weaker infants would die, but that's one step from seeing Dwarven Eugenics thread.

[Brotato]

This is an incredibly common suggestion.