Barts and The London, Queen Mary's School of Medicine and Dentistry
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| Barts and The London, Queen Mary's School of Medicine and Dentistry | |
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| Established | 1995 as a combined institution. |
| President | The Rt Hon The Lord Mayor of London |
| Warden | Professor Sir Nick Wright |
| Location | London, United Kingdom |
| Students | 2300 total |
| Homepage | http://www.smd.qmul.ac.uk |
It was formed in that year by the merger of the London Hospital Medical College (the oldest medical school in England and Wales, founded in 1785), the Medical College of St Bartholomew's Hospital (the hospital having been founded in about 1123, but formally teaching medicine since around 1843) and Queen Mary and Westfield College (which began teaching medicine in 1989). St Bartholomew's hospital is, notably, the oldest hospital in England.
The school exists on three main sites, having a presence at Queen Mary's main (Mile End) campus as well as at the site of both of the former colleges at and near their respective hospitals, St Bartholomew's Hospital (in Smithfield, City of London and nearby in Charterhouse Square), and the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel, Tower Hamlets. A new building (Blizard Building), named after the founder of The London Hospital Medical College, Sir William Blizard, has recently been completed at the Royal London site, and houses both laboratories and the main site for medical undergraduate teaching.
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[edit] Barts and The London Students' Association
Barts and The London Students' Association is the students' union for the medical school, an autonomous part of Queen Mary Students' Union (QMSU) formed when the Students Union of St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School and the London Hospital Clubs Union merged with QMSU at the time their parent bodies merged in 1995. The medical school's Students' Association has a very distinct culture from that of QMSU, and has separate clubs and societies for most sports. Because the Students' Association's constitution precludes religious societies, there is a "combined" Islamic Society with Queen Mary Students' Union, and some of the smaller sports also have combined medic/non-medic clubs as neither QMSU nor the Students' Association could muster sufficient numbers alone to form a full team.
The merger of the two medical schools with Queen Mary and Westfield College in 1995 was not without considerable pain as three institutions with long, separate and distinct histories and cultures came together. For example, Barts Medical School and The London Hospital Medical College both had large influential drinking societies, the Barts Wine Committee and The London Dionysian Society respectively.
The focal point for the social life in all the medical schools in London prior to their mergers with each other and with multi-faculty institutions had been their respective bars. Barts Bar had been run entirely by the Barts Wine Committee and had attained notoriety and some respect amongst the medical schools of London for its social life; the feeling of loss when this changed after the merger typified the initial sense of grievance held by the students at the time of the mergers. After the merger of the two schools with Queen Mary and Westfield, there was a period of intense animosity between the medical students and the non-medics, and between the two groups of medical students, often resulting in tit-for-tat pranks. This has since cooled to a modest rivalry, with an annual rugby sevens match.
The Wine Committee hosts various events during the year including The Smoker - a comedy review started during the 1890s as "Smoking Concerts" and revived in the 1960s by Graham Chapman amongst others - and a charity Christmas Dinner for local older people. Meanwhile, the influence of the drinking societies on the running of the Students' Association has diminished almost to nothing as more diverse interests have come to the fore in the Association's elected committees, and the running of the medic bars has been taken over to some extent by Queen Mary Students' Union.
An annual Merger Cup competition has taken place between the medics (Barts and The London Students' Association) and the non-medics (Queen Mary Students' Union) annually since the merger in 1995, with sporting matches in all of the sports where both bodies have a team. One point is awarded to the winner of each sport, and the side with the most points wins. Overall, the medics have won more often than not, despite the teams being drawn from a much smaller student population; this is sometimes ascribed to the strong sense of team identity forged by the cohesive nature of medical school.
[edit] Alumni of The London Hospital Medical School and Barts Medical School
Famous alumni from some of the institutions which combined to form the current medical school include Elizabeth Blackwell (the first English female doctor), Lord Professor Robert Winston, Graham Chapman, James Parkinson, Wendy Savage, William Harvey, Sir James Paget, Percival Pott and Jay Sean.
[edit] See Also
[edit] External links
| UK Medical Schools | |
|---|---|
| England | Birmingham, Bristol, Brighton and Sussex, Cambridge, Durham*, UEA, Hull York, Keele, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, London (Barts, Imperial, King's, Royal Free and UCL, St George's), Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, Oxford, Peninsula, Sheffield, Southampton, Warwick. |
| Scotland | Aberdeen, Bute (St Andrews)*, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow. |
| Wales | Cardiff, Swansea. |
| Northern Ireland | Queen's Belfast. |
| * Durham and Bute (St Andrews) offer a pre-clinical course only, with students transferring to another university to complete their clinical studies | |
