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
Image:Barsmall logo.png
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

Barts and The London, Queen Mary's School of Medicine and Dentistry (also known as BL or often referred to simply as Barts) is the medical school of Queen Mary, University of London (Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London) and has existed in this form since 1995.

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 and teaching medicine from that date, initially as an apprenticeship until it formally became a medical college in1843) and Queen Mary and Westfield College (which began teaching medicine in 1989). St Bartholomew's hospital is, notably, the oldest remaining 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.

Contents

Part of the Charterhouse Square site
Part of the Charterhouse Square site

St Bartholomew's and the Royal London School of Medicine and Dentistry was formed in 1995 by a merger of St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College and the London Hospital Medical College with Queen Mary and Westfield College, now known as Queen Mary, University of London.

The Medical College at the Royal London Hospital, England's first medical school, opened in 1785, pioneering a new kind of medical education providing teaching in theory as well as clinical skills.

A purpose-built lecture theatre was constructed at St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1791 and in 1822 the Governors approved the provision of medical education within the Hospital. Later a residential college was established, which moved to premises at Charterhouse Square in the 1930s. At The London, larger premises, still in use in the present School of Medicine and Dentistry, were built in Turner Street in 1854.

In 1900 both medical colleges became constituent colleges of University of London in the Faculty of Medicine.

The Dental School opened at The London in 1911, acquiring the new Dental Institute and expanding student numbers during the 1960s. Dental education developed during the 1970s, increasing the collaboration between dentists and other professionals.

Between the Wars, students at The London needing to complete a First MB (in Biology, Chemistry and Physics) attended Queen Mary College for a year before proceeding to Second MB at The London.

Women students were first admitted to both colleges following World War II.

A close association between the two medical colleges was developed following the Royal Commission on Medical Education in 1968, and new links with the then Queen Mary College were established at the same time. In 1989 the pre-clinical teaching at the two medical colleges was merged and sited at the Basic Medical Sciences Building at Queen Mary. In 1992, Barts, The London and the London Chest Hospital joined to form the (now) Barts and The London NHS Trust, with a full merger of the medical colleges with Queen Mary taking place three years later. Today Barts and The London is one of Britain's leading medical and dental schools with 1,600 undergraduate and 750 postgraduate students and a growing reputation for research across many disciplines.

Crest of Barts and The London Students' Association
Crest of 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 still both have large influential drinking societies, the Barts Wine Committee and The London Dionysian Society respectively. The Barts Wine Committee is still very active and there are currently around twelve members of the committee. They can be found on www.bartswineco.com and encourage former members to get in touch.

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 and a continuous stream of banter throughout the year!

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, as well as helping with the summer ball.

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.

Famous alumni from some of the institutions which combined to form the current medical school include:

Jarri Amini Hira Naqvi Jasveen Matharu

  • Harold Legg - Doctor in the British soap opera EastEnders from 1985–1997, making guest appearances in 2000 and 2004
  • Doctor Watson - Sherlock Holmes's companion and "biographer": not only did the two first meet in the pathology laboratories, but also Watson referrs to his time as a "dresser" (the equivalent nowadays of the surgical houseman) at Bart's

v • d • e
List of medical schools in the United Kingdom
England North: Durham1 · HYMS · Leeds · Liverpool · Manchester · Newcastle · Sheffield

Midlands: Birmingham · Keele · Leicester  · Nottingham · Warwick2

South: Brighton & Sussex · Bristol · Cambridge · UEA · Oxford · Peninsula · Southampton

London3: Barts · Imperial · King's · Royal Free & UCL · St George's
Scotland Aberdeen · Bute4 · Dundee · Edinburgh · Glasgow
Wales Cardiff · Swansea
Northern Ireland Queen's University Belfast
1In conjunction with Newcastle, 2 year pre-clinical course only 2Graduate course only 3All London medical schools apart from Imperial College are colleges of the University of London, although for practical purposes they are autonomous 4Part of the University of St Andrews, pre-clinical course only
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barts_and_The_London%2C_Queen_Mary%27s_School_of_Medicine_and_Dentistry"
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