James Syme - Clinical Teaching

Clinical Teaching

In 1824-1825, he started the Brown Square school of medicine, but again disagreed with his partners in the venture. Announcing his intention to practise surgery only, Syme started a surgical hospital of his own, Minto House hospital, which he carried on from May 1829 to September 1833, with great success as a surgical charity and school of clinical instruction. It was here that he first put into practice his method of clinical teaching, which consisted in having the patients to be operated or prelected upon brought from the ward into a lecture-room or theatre where the students were seated conveniently for seeing and taking notes.

His private practice had become very considerable, his position having been assured ever since his amputation at the hip joint in 1823, the first operation of the kind in Scotland. In 1833 he succeeded James Russell as professor of clinical surgery in the university. Syme's accession to the clinical chair was marked by two important changes in the conditions of it: the first was that the professor should have the care of surgical patients in the infirmary in right of his professorship, and the second, that attendance on his course should be obligatory on all candidates for the medical degree. When Liston removed to London in 1835 Syme became the leading consulting surgeon in Scotland.