Belfast Congress September 2009 of the British Society for the History of Medicine

This version of a report on the Congress is mainly taken from the announcement with tenses changed from future to past. A fuller report with photographs will be added later, and we intend to publish abstracts of many of the papers.

Logo of Stranmillis University College The 23rd Congress was held in Belfast in September 2009, Wed 2nd Sept to Sat 5th Sept. The Congress was held at Stranmillis University College, a college of Queen's University Belfast. Stranmillis was founded in 1922 to provide state funded teacher training but now provides other courses and a conference centre.

Belfast Congress

Hosts were The Ulster Society for the History of Medicine(USHM) with the support and cooperation of the Centre for the History of Medicine in Ireland(CHOMI), medical historians at the University of Ulster, which is a partnership with University College Dublin. Organisers from USHM were Dr Ethna O'Gorman and Dr Robert Montgomery. From CHOMI, Professa Greta Jones organised the submission of abstracts, and Dr Susan Kelly organised the poster session.

Secretary to the Congress was Jayne Keilty email jayne.keilty@googlemail.com (preferred address). Work email address is jayne.keilty@belfasttrust.hscni.net

Congress programme

Delegates to the Conference enjoyed a full and varied programme. There were were two sessions on Irish Medical History (Thursday & Saturday mornings), one on Pharmacy, Medical Education and Medical Biography (Thursday afternoon ), with a Free-standing Papers session on Friday morning. On Friday afternoon, we visited Killyleagh, birthplace of Sir Hans Sloane. We toured the castle where he received some of his education, saw the church where he was baptised, the graves of his parents, the site of the house where he was born, and his statue.

A few examples of the range of subjects presented during the Conference are as follows:

Topics relating to Irish medical history include the Irish National Anti-Tuberculosis League, the Royal College of Physicians & the regulation of Irish Midwives, the Irish Apothecaries Act of 1791, the Mater Infirmorum Hospital & the NHS, Partition & its impact on Irish Medical History, and Dracula's Asylum & Sir William Thornley Stokes.
The movement of medicines between India & Britain 1857-1947, One hundred years of secret remedies, and the trials & tribulations of the treatment of TB will feature in the Pharmacy & Education programme.
Medical Biography included talks on Dr Vera Scantlebury Brown, Sir William Osler, and Dr James Y. Simpson.
On the Friday morning heard about digital skiagraphy, plague prevention in the Ionian Islands, and the history of anatomy from the Renaissance to the present day.
There were a number of presentations by medical students.
At the morning session on Thursday morning, a Keynote Lecture was be given by Professor Tom Baskett on 'Frank Pantridge and the origins of pre-hospital coronary care'.

The schedule of talks is available as Belfast programme (Word document) and Belfast programme (Web page)

Student oral presentation prize

This prize was awarded to David Sawbridge MA (Cantab), a medical student at the University of Edinburgh for his talk: 'Lazy, slothful and indolent': Medical and social perceptions of obesity to the eighteenth cemtury: A thematic approach.

Poster session, with student poster prize

There was an exhibition of posters on topics relating to the History of Medicine (HoM). There was a prize for the best poster from a student.
The prize was open to students of History enrolled in an Irish or UK University, or medical students who have completed a Module /Student Selected Component in the HoM at an UK University. In addition History of Medicine students who have not yet completed a PHD were eligible for the prize. The organiser of the poster session was Dr Susan Kelly - email SK.Kelly@ulster.ac.uk.

The prize was awarded to Tharu Tharakan, a medical student from Imperial College London, for his poster:
Politics, Pilots and Potatoes. The experience of R.A.F. Prisoners of War in Germany during World War 2.

The other student posters were from:

Julia Hogg, Bute Medical School, University of St Andrews on "The 1918-19 Influenza Pandemic in Scotland.
Ida Milne, School of History and Humanities, Trinity College, Dublin on "Spanish Flu - The influence of a disease on power and people in Ireland, 1918-1919".
Jessica Morrow, School of Medicine and Dentistry, Queens University, Belfast on "Reconstructing the history of facial plastic surgery".
Leila Nutine, Bute Medical School, University of St Andrews on "The rise and fall of the barefoot doctor movement in China"

In addition there was a poster from Dr Susam Kelly titled "And so to bed - Memories of immobilisation from past patients with bone and joint tuberculosis". There was also an exhibition of photographs of the Titanic.

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This page by David Hawgood was amended 12 Sept 2009