Dublin Medical Institutions
SURGICAL AND MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS.
The Royal College of Surgeons was incorporated in 1784, for the purpose of establishing a " liberal and extensive system of surgical education:" a parliamentary grant was afterwards conferred on it for providing the necessary accommodations. Sums amounting in the whole to £35,000 were granted for erecting and furnishing the requisite buildings; besides which, £6000, the accumulated excess of the receipts over the disbursements of the college, were expended in 1825 in the addition of a museum. The front of the building, which is situated on the west side of St. Stephen's-green, has a rusticated basement story, from which rises a range of Doric columns supporting a tier of seven large windows, the four central columns being surmounted by a triangular pediment, on which are statues of Minerva, Esculapius and Hygeia. The interior contains a large board-room, a library, an apartment for general meetings, an examination hall, with several committee-rooms and offices, four theatres for lectures, a spacious dissecting-room with several smaller apartments, and three museums, the largest of which, 84 feet by 30, with a gallery, contains a fine collection of preparations of human and comparative anatomy; the second, with two galleries, contains preparations illustrative of pathology and a collection of models in wax, presented by the Duke of Northumberland when lord-lieutenant; and the third, attached to the anatomical theatre, contains a collection for the illustration of the daily courses of lectures.
The College consists of a president, vice-president, six censors, twelve assistants, secretaries, members, and licentiates. Candidates for a diploma must produce certificates of attendance on some school of medicine and surgery for five years, and of attendance at a surgical hospital for three years, and must pass four half-yearly examinations, and a final examination for letters testimonial in the presence of the members and licentiates on two days: rejected candidates have a right of appeal to a court constituted for the purpose, which is frequently resorted to. Attached to the school are two professors of anatomy and physiology, two of surgery, a professor of chymistry, one of the practice of medicine, one of materia medica, one of midwifery, and one of medical jurisprudence, with four anatomical demonstrators; the lectures commence on the last Monday in October, and close on the last day of April.
The College of Physicians was first incorporated in the reign of Chas II., but the charter being found insufficient, was surrendered in 1692, and a more ample charter was granted by William and Mary, under the designation of the King and Queen's College of Physicians in Ireland. This charter, which conferred considerable privileges, was partly confirmed by successive acts - of parliament, which gave the society authority to summon all medical practitioners for examination, to inspect the shops and warehouses of apothecaries, druggists, and chymists, and to destroy all articles for medical use which are of bad quality: it has also a principal share in the superintendence of the School of Physic. No person can be a member of the College who has not graduated in one of the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, or Dublin. The officers of the college consist of a president, vice-president, four censors, a registrar, and a treasurer; the members hold their meetings at Sir Patrick Dun's hospital, of whose bequests for the promotion of medical science they are trustees. The School of Physic is partly under the control of the Board of the University, and partly under that of the College of Physicians; the professorships of anatomy, chymistry, and botany being in the appointment of the University, who elect the professors, thence called University professors; those of the practice of medicine, the institutes of medicine, and of the materia medica, called King's professors, derive their appointment and their salaries from the College of Physicians, being chosen by ballot from among the members of that body. The University professors deliver their lectures in Trinity College, and the King's professors in Sir Patrick Dun's hospital. No candidate is qualified for a degree in medicine until he has attended the six courses, and six months at Sir Patrick Dun's clinical hospital.
The School of Pharmacy. Previously to the company of the Apothecaries' Hall having been incorporated, the shops were supplied by the druggists, without any check on the quality of the medical articles supplied. To remedy this defect an act was passed, in 1791, incorporating a body under the title of the "Governor and Company of the Apothecaries' Hall," by whom a building was erected in Mary-street (a respectable edifice of brick, with a basement of hewn stone) for the preparation and sale of drugs, unadulterated and of the best quality, and for the delivery of courses of lectures on chymistry, the materia medica, pharmacy, botany, and the practice of physic, and for the examination of candidates for a diploma to practise as apothecaries. The establishment consists of a governor, deputy-governor, treasurer, secretary, and thirteen directors. Candidates for apprenticeship must undergo an examination in Greek and Latin, and those for the rank of master apothecary must produce certificates of attendance on a course of each of the following departments of medicine; chymistry, materia medica and pharmacy, medical botany, anatomy, and physiology, and the theory and practice of medicine. The diploma of the society of Apothecaries of London also, by the rules of the Dublin company, qualifies the holder to practise in Ireland.
The School of Anatomy, Medicine, and Surgery, in Park-street, Merrion-square, established in 1824 by a society of surgeons and physicians, contains a museum, a chymical laboratory, an office and reading-room, a lecture-room capable of accommodating 200 persons, a dissecting-room, and rooms for preparations. Private medical schools are numerous, and, combined with the public institutions, and with the extensive practice afforded by the city hospitals, have render-ed Dublin a celebrated school of medicine, resorted to by students from every part of the British empire. The Phrenological Society, under the direction of a president, vice-president, and two committees, was established in 1829. Its meetings are held in Upper Sackville-street, where the society has a large collection of casts illustrative of the theory of the science, and a library of phrenological treatises, which are lent out to the members: the annual subscription is one guinea. The Association of Members of the College of Physicians was instituted in 1816; they hold their meetings at their rooms in College-green, for receiving communications on medical subjects and on scientific matters; their object is the promotion of medical science, and among their corresponding members are some of the most eminent medical men in England and on the Continent: the society has published several volumes of transactions.