Abbreviation | RCPE |
---|---|
Established | 1681 |
Type | Medical royal colleges |
Location | |
Coordinates | 55°57′18″N3°11′47″W / 55.9550°N 3.1965°W |
Membership (2023) | 14,000 |
President | Andrew Elder |
Affiliations | |
Website | www |
The Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE) is a medical royal college in Scotland. It is one of three organisations that sets the specialty training standards for physicians in the United Kingdom. [1] It was established by Royal charter in 1681. The college has over 14,000 fellows and members worldwide. [2]
The RCPE was formed by a royal charter, granted in 1681, with Sir Robert Sibbald recognised as playing a key part in the negotiations. [3] Three applications preceded this and had been unsuccessful. [4] : 49 There were 21 original Fellows, eleven of whom were graduates or students of the University of Leiden. [3] : 652 The Universities (Scotland) Act 1858 resulted in several items from the college's charter becoming obsolete, and they obtained a further charter on 31 October 1861. [4] : 50 In 1920 the college enacted changes that allowed women to be admitted on the same terms as men. [4] : 50 The charter was amended on 7 May 2005. [5]
In 1699 the college first published a medical guide with standardised recipes Pharmacopoea Colegi Regii Medicorum Edimburgensium; [6] thirteen editions of this Edinburgh Pharmacopoeia were published until 1841 when it was replaced by a British Pharmacopoeia. [3] : 653
In 1704 the college acquired a house and grounds on Fountain Close, on the Cowgate, in the Old Town. [7]
On 27 November 1775 William Cullen laid the foundation stone for a new hall and library in George Street in the New Town. Architect James Craig, had ideas about expansion but the builders of neighbouring properties found favour instead. [8] : 16 The hall was not fully completed until 1830. [4] : 50 Unfortunately the great cost of the hall's exterior exhausted the college's finances leaving no money to finish the interior of a building. The college's debt was so much that there was talk of selling the Hall before it was even occupied. The Hall was sold to the Commercial Bank of Scotland in 1841 and was demolished. [3] [9] [10]
Between 1843 and 1846 the college did not own a meeting place, instead renting a premises at 119 George Street. [4] : 50
The foundation stone of a new Hall at 9 Queen Street was laid on 8 August 1844. [4] The new Queen Street Hall was designed by Thomas Hamilton. [11] The Queen Street Hall was completed in 1846. [12]
An adjacent building, Number 8 Queen Street was designed by Robert Adam as a house for Robert Ord and built between 1770 and 1771, one of the earliest New Town constructions. [13] In 1868 it was purchased by the college, who then leased it to other organisations until 1957. [13] A restoration project began in 1990 and lasted seven years. [14]
Numbers 11 and 12 were built around 1780. [15] They were purchased by the college in the 20th century. The space behind 11 was used for the Conference Centre and 12 contains flexible meeting rooms and office space.
In 1984 the college put Richard Dadd's painting of Alexander Morison up for sale, to raise money to treat dry rot. [16]
In 1682, Robert Sibbald donated around one hundred books to the college. [17] At the end of the 18th century the library was located at the Royal Infirmary. [4] : 50 The college's library in Queen Street bears Sibbald's name in commemoration. [17] [18] The library also has artefacts, such as a medicine chest that belonged to Stuart Threipland, physician to Bonnie Prince Charlie. [19] In the 1960s, the information held by the library was modern. [20] From the sixties onward, medical information became more available and college's library became more known for its historical works. [17]
In 2015, a project with the University of Glasgow digitised a collection of 5,000 letters of William Cullen from the mid-1750s to 1790, making them available online. [21]
As of 2016 [update] , the college has catalogued more than 30,000 records that are in its archives. [22]
In 1888 the college took the decision to establish its own research laboratory and initially rented a house in Lauriston Lane, near the Royal Infirmary. [23] A three-storey building on Forest Road was acquired and in 1896 was formally opened as the college's new laboratory. It had areas equipped and fitted for a range of disciplines: Bacteriological, Chemical, and Histological and Experimental. [23] With the creation of the NHS, the laboratory could not depend upon income from their reporting service and it closed in 1950. [3] : 654
The Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (JRCPE) is a peer reviewed medical journal published quarterly by the college. It was established in 1971 as Chronicle, [24] renamed in 1988 to Proceedings of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, [25] and obtained its current title in 2002. [26]
Following successful completion of the MRCP(UK) or MRCPCH examinations, doctors are eligible to become Members of the college. [27]
Sir Robert Sibbald was a Scottish physician and antiquary.
Sir Robert Christison, 1st Baronet, was a Scottish toxicologist and physician who served as president of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and as president of the British Medical Association (1875). He was the first person to describe renal anaemia.
This article is a timeline of the history of Edinburgh, Scotland, up to the present day. It traces its rise from an early hill fort and later royal residence to the bustling city and capital of Scotland that it is today.
The Royal Edinburgh Hospital is a psychiatric hospital in Morningside Place, Edinburgh, Scotland. It is managed by NHS Lothian.
Sir Andrew Balfour was a Scottish doctor, botanist, antiquary and book collector, the youngest brother of the antiquarian Sir James Balfour, 1st Baronet.
Sir Abraham Goldberg was a British physician who was a Regius Professor of the Practice of Medicine at the University of Glasgow. He was educated at George Heriot's School in Edinburgh and the University of Edinburgh.
Andrew Duncan, the elder FRSE FRCPE FSA (Scot) was a British physician and professor at the University of Edinburgh. He was joint founder of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. As first proposer of an asylum in Edinburgh he gives his name to the Andrew Duncan Clinic which forms part of the Edinburgh City Hospital.
George Street is the central thoroughfare of the First New Town of Edinburgh, planned in the 18th century by James Craig.
Alexander Wiseman MacAra, also known as Sandy MacAra, was a Scottish professor of epidemiology at Bristol University and chairman of British Medical Association (BMA) from 1993 to 1998.
Sir Robert William Philip was a Scottish physician and pioneer in the treatment and control of tuberculosis.
Alexander Keiller FRSE LLD was a Scottish physician and gynaecologist who served as President of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh 1875–77.
The Edinburgh Pharmacopoeia was a medical guide consisting of recipes and methods for making medicine. It was first published by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh in 1699 as the Pharmacopoea Collegii Regii Medicorum Edimburgensium. The Edinburgh Pharmacopeia merged with the London and Dublin Pharmacopoeia's in 1864 creating the British Pharmacopoeia.
The Edinburgh College of Medicine for Women was established by Elsie Inglis and her father John Inglis. Elsie Inglis went on to become a leader in the suffrage movement and found the Scottish Women's Hospital organisation in World War I, but when she jointly founded the college she was still a medical student. Her father, John Inglis, had been a senior civil servant in India, where he had championed the cause of education for women. On his return to Edinburgh he became a supporter of medical education for women and used his influence to help establish the college. The college was founded in 1889 at a time when women were not admitted to university medical schools in the UK.
Dr William RussellFRCPE LLD, was a Scottish pathologist and physician who became Professor of Medicine at the University of Edinburgh and president of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. He was the first to describe the cellular inclusion particles known as Russell bodies. He was an early supporter of medical education for women.
Sir John Sibbald FRSE FBSE was a 19th-century Scottish physician and amateur botanist. In 1855/56, aged 22, he served as president of the Royal Medical Society.
Ronald Foote Robertson PRCPE was a 20th-century Scottish physician who served as president of the British Medical Association 1983/4 and president of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh for the period 1976 to 1979. He was official Physician in Scotland to Queen Elizabeth II. He was affectionately known as Ronnie Robertson.
Sir Neil James Douglas was a medical doctor and was president of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE) 2004–2010 and chairman of the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges (AoMRC) 2009–2012.
Events from the year 1681 in the Kingdom of Scotland.
Extramural medical education in Edinburgh began over 200 years before the university medical faculty was founded in 1726 and extramural teaching continued thereafter for a further 200 years. Extramural is academic education which is conducted outside a university. In the early 16th century it was under the auspices of the Incorporation of Surgeons of Edinburgh (RCSEd) and continued after the Faculty of Medicine was established by the University of Edinburgh in 1726. Throughout the late 18th and 19th centuries the demand for extramural medical teaching increased as Edinburgh's reputation as a centre for medical education grew. Instruction was carried out by individual teachers, by groups of teachers and, by the end of the 19th century, by private medical schools in the city. Together these comprised the Edinburgh Extramural School of Medicine. From 1896 many of the schools were incorporated into the Medical School of the Royal Colleges of Edinburgh under the aegis of the RCSEd and the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE) and based at Surgeons' Hall. Extramural undergraduate medical education in Edinburgh stopped in 1948 with the closure of the Royal Colleges' Medical School following the Goodenough Report which recommended that all undergraduate medical education in the UK should be carried out by universities.