The increasing power of medical networks in the Nord departement in the 19th century

The build-up of medical implantation in the Nord department over the XIXth century is studied through four parameters. The first is the evolution of m edical demography. This latter, roughly parallel to general demography, fea tures two essential aspects: medicalization of the countryside by poorly qu alified practitioners, the officers of health, and the overmedicalization o f the Lille arrondissement. The improvement of the training facilities and the creation of new medical schools allow, at the end of the century, to re place the hardly competent elements by doctors. The hospital implantation r emains precarious down to the end of the Second Empire; improvements ate no table after 1871, but remain very irregularly spread. Lille enjoys a very p rivileged position in the department.