Tulane University School of Medicine

Tulane University School of Medicine
Former names
 Medical College of Louisiana
Type Private medical school
Established 1834
Parent institution
 Tulane University
Dean L. Lee Hamm III, MD, FACP
Academic staff
 309 (full-time)
1,289 (part-time)
Students 640
Location New Orleans, Louisiana, United States
Campus Urban
Website www.som.tulane.edu

The Tulane University School of Medicine is located in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States and is a part of Tulane University. The school is located in the Medical District of the New Orleans Central Business District.

History

The Tulane School of Medicine, located in the Medical District of downtown New Orleans.

The school was founded in 1834 as the Medical College of Louisiana and is the 15th oldest medical school in the United States and the 2nd oldest in the deep south. The first classes were held in 1835 at a variety of locations, including Charity Hospital and the Strangers Unitarian Church.

Early Founding

In October 1832, Dr. Warren Stone, a young physician who received his medical degree from the Medical School of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, was one of 108 passengers aboard an ill-fated brig, the Amelia, which set sail from New York to New Orleans carrying valuable cargo. On the fourth day out, a terrific storm occurred; the passengers were put below and the hatches were battened down. When the storm lifted, it was discovered that twenty-five passengers were in advanced stages of cholera. On October 30, the Amelia attempted unsuccessfully to make the Charleston harbor. Leaking badly, she was beached on Folly Island and had to be burned. Her passengers were made as comfortable as possible. Charleston Port authorities quarantined the island and put a young physician, Thomas Hunt, in charge of the situation with Dr. Stone as first assistant. The experiences shared by the two young doctors brought them into a friendship, which lasted throughout their lives. They were on Folly Island for three weeks, during which time Dr. Stone ignited the imagination of Hunt with the great medical possibilities in epidemic-ridden Louisiana. It is said that these two kindred spirits discussed plans for a medical college in New Orleans. After several weeks the quarantine was lifted, and Warren Stone departed for New Orleans while Hunt returned to his home in Charleston, accompanied by an attack of cholera. Hunt resolved to join Stone in New Orleans as soon as possible. When Dr. Stone arrived in New Orleans, he found the city plagued with epidemics of yellow fever and cholera. He immediately accepted a position at Charity Hospital, which had just been completed. When Hunt later reached New Orleans, he also joined the staff of Charity Hospital, all the while cherishing his dream of a medical college in the city. In addition to resuming his friendship with Stone, he also became associated with other young physicians: John Hoffman Harrison, Thomas Ingalls, Charles A. Luzenberg, James Monroe Mackie, Augustus Cenas, and Edwin Bathurst Smith. Men of vision, energy, and determination, all were graduates of reputable medical schools. Realizing the need for educated physicians in the South, they visualized the growth of a medical school in New Orleans built around the clinics of Charity Hospital. When Dr. Hunt was ready to begin the project of which he had long dreamed, he turned to Drs. Stone, Luzenberg, and Harrison. "These four pooled their resources, making a sort of informal, unchartered stock company, chose the other doctors to help, [and] divided up the fields of instruction..."1 A Prospectus was published in The Bee (September 1834), written by Thomas Hunt and bearing the signatures of Drs. Hunt, Luzenberg, Harrison, Mackie, Cenas, Ingalls, and Smith. The daring, optimistic Prospectus stated that the young doctors hoped to "...advance the cause of science, and to disseminate rational principles so as to remove or alleviate human suffering..."2 Although the Prospectus was received with catcalls rather than enthusiasm, the young physicians' determination remained undaunted.

Late 1800s to present

The first permanent building for the school was constructed in the French Quarter in 1844. In 1893, the school moved to Canal Street in the Richardson building, and then shortly after to the Hutchison Building, also on Canal. Finally, in 1930, the school moved to its current location—the Hutchinson Memorial Building—on Tulane Avenue, next to Charity Hospital.[1]

In 2007 the school acquired the Murphy Oil Building on S. Robertson by donation. The Murphy building houses the DeBakey Educational Center, a simulation center, a student lounge with gym, and several administrative offices.

Admissions and Research

The school has highly competitive admissions, accepting only 175 medical students from more than 10,000 applications. About 40 percent of the students in each class are concurrently enrolled as candidates for the Master of Public Health degree in the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. It is estimated that Tulane University has graduated more than 40 percent of all physicians in the U.S. who have earned both M.D. and master of public health degrees.

Tulane University Hospital, located in the Medical District of downtown New Orleans and adjacent to the School of Medicine.

In 2001 the Tulane Center for Gene Therapy started as the first major center in the U.S. to focus on research using adult stem cells.

Today, the medical school is but one part of the Tulane University Health Sciences Center, which includes the School of Medicine, the Tulane University Hospital and Clinic, the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, the University Health Service, the Tulane National Primate Research Center, the U.S.-Japan Biomedical Research Laboratories, and the Tulane/Xavier Center for Bioenvironmental Research. Most components of the Health Sciences Center are located in the heart of New Orleans, in the medical district that comprises Tulane facilities and the LSU/Charity Hospital center just north of the New Orleans Central Business District. It comprises 20 academic departments: Anesthesiology, Biochemistry, Family and Community Medicine, Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology, Neurosurgery, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Ophthalmology, Orthopaedics, Otolaryngology, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Pediatrics, Pharmacology, Physiology, Psychiatry and Neurology, Radiology, Structural and Cellular Biology, Surgery and Urology.

The school periodically hosts social events with the Tulane University Law School and the Freeman School of Business.

On August 31, 2009, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal along with Tulane President Scott Cowen and Louisiana State University System President John V. Lombardi approved a plan to establish both schools as board members for the future $1.1 billion University Medical Center New Orleans. Ground was broken in 2011 and the hospital opened on August 1, 2015.[2] The 446-bed hospital serves as the flagship for Tulane medical students and residents.

Facilities

Notable alumni and faculty

Dr George E. Burch
Michael DeBakey, renowned heart surgeon who invented the roller pump
Luther Terry, former U.S. Surgeon General, who issued the first warning that tobacco is a health hazard

Affiliations

Clinical Departments

Centers

Programs

TUHC Centers of Excellence

References

  1. ↑ History of Tulane University School of Medicine, http://www.tulane.edu/~matas/historical/medschool/founders.htm
  2. ↑ "Tulane University - University Medical Center moves forward". http://www.tulane.edu. Retrieved 2009-08-31. External link in |publisher= (help)
  3. ↑ Chang PW, Chen B, Jones CE, Bunting K, Chakraborti C, Kahn MJ. Virtual Reality Supported Teaching at Low-Cost (VRSTL): A review of current technologies and a pilot for low-cost VR for medical students. Tulane Health Science Research Day; April 7, 2016; New Orleans, LA
  4. ↑ Chen B, Chang PW, Jones CE, Bunting K, Chakraborti C, Kahn MJ. Virtual Reality Supported Teaching at Low-Cost (VRSTL): Preliminary Findings of a Novel Teaching Method at the Medical School Level. Medical Education Day; May 10th, 2016; New Orleans, LA
  5. ↑ http://www.tulane.edu/~matas/historical/SpecColl/Bass/bassindex.pdf
  6. ↑ Paul M. Davis, Jr., obituary, The Alexandria Town Talk, February 14, 2007
  7. ↑ "Felix Octave Pavy". New Orleans Times-Picayune. May 14, 1962. Retrieved March 7, 2015.
  8. ↑ Henry E. Chambers, A History of Louisiana, Vol. 2, (Chicago and New York City: The American Historical Society, Inc., 1925), pp. 259-260

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