| King's College London School of Medicine | ||||||
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| Established | 1550 (St Thomas's Hospital Medical School) 1825 (Guy's Hospital Medical School) 1982 (United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals) 1998 (Guy's, King's and St Thomas' School of Medicine) 2005 (King's College London School of Medicine) |
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| Type | Medical school | |||||
| Dean | Professor Robert Lechler | |||||
| Location | London, England | |||||
| Colours | Navy blue, Gold, Purple, White, Red |
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| Affiliations | King's College London, University of London | |||||
| Website | www.kcl.ac.uk/schools/medicine | |||||
King's College London School of Medicine (informally KCLMS) is the medical school of King's College London, and one of the United Hospitals. The school has campuses at Guy's Hospital (Southwark), King's College Hospital (Lambeth) and St Thomas' Hospital (Lambeth) in London.
The school in its current guise was formed when it joined with Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals (both on the south bank of the Thames in central London), following a merger with the United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals in August 1998.
The combined entity was originally referred to as the GKT School of Medicine between 1998 and 2005. However due to confusion over the official name of the institute, especially with regards to research emerging from the university, it was rebranded as the King's College London School of Medicine and Dentistry at Guy's, King's College and St Thomas' Hospitals. The medical school as a whole is the largest in Europe. It has an annual intake of around 335 places on the standard MBBS Programme, 50 places on the Extended Medical Degree Programme (EMDP) and 28 places on the Graduate Medical Program.[1] It receives more applications for medicine than any other UK medical school and as of 2007 applicants were required to sit the UKCAT admission test.
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Of the three hospitals associated with King's College London School of Medicine and Dentistry, St Thomas' Hospital is the oldest and was founded in 1173. Sir Thomas Guy, a governor of St Thomas', founded Guy's Hospital in 1721 as a place to treat 'incurables' discharged from St Thomas'.
St Thomas's Hospital Medical School was founded in 1550 and was sited across St Thomas' Hospital and Guy's Hospital. In 1769 it was decided that Guy's would teach mainly medical subjects, whereas St Thomas' would focus on surgery[2] and the joint teaching institution was generally known as The Borough Hospitals. However, a dispute between the two hospitals regarding the successor to Sir Astley Cooper resulted in Guy's Hospital establishing its own medical school in 1825. After this, students of surgeons attended operations at both hospitals until 1836. A riot between students of the two hospitals broke out in the operating theatre at St. Thomas's in 1836 which ended the arrangement.[3] St Thomas's Hospital Medical School and Guy's Hospital Medical School were two of the oldest and most prestigious medical schools in the UK.
In 1982 the two medical schools decided to merge and formed the United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals, more commonly known as UMDS. It was enlarged in 1983 when the Royal Dental Hospital of London School of Dental Surgery merged with Guy's Hospital Dental School, and again in 1985 with the addition of the Postgraduate Institute of Dermatology.[4]
Initially students of UMDS were allocated to one of the two campuses, with most preclinical teaching and all clinical teaching being separate. With the intake of 1989, students ceased being allocated in this way, and teaching for all students was divided between the campuses and their peripheral hospitals.
Discussions between King's College London (which had trained medical students since it was established and founded its own hospital, King's College Hospital, in 1840) and UMDS regarding a further merger began in 1992. UMDS was subsequently absorbed into King's College London in 1998, forming the Guy's, King's and St Thomas' School of Medicine, more commonly known as GKT.[5] In 2005, the entity was rebranded King's College London School of Medicine and Dentistry at Guy's, King's College and St Thomas' Hospitals, also known as KCLMS. However it is still widely known as GKT amongst current students, graduates and consultants who consider themselves affiliated to the hospitals rather than the university.
Recently the dental school became the Dental Institute and the remainder was renamed the King's College School of Medicine. The dean, Robert Lechler, oversees the running of both the Medical and Dental schools, as well as the School of Biomedical Sciences (all three were formerly regarded as GKT before the rebranding). However each has its own dean; the Dean of School of Medicine is Anne Greenough while the Dean of the Dental Institute is Nairn Wilson.
The School' s research excellence is recognised worldwide and the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise confirmed King's as one of the top two universities in the UK for health research strength.[6] Around 70 percent of health science submissions from King's were ranked in the top six within the UK.
Currently, the School hosts six MRC Centres,[7] more than anywhere else in the world:
The two MRC Centres in Transplantation and the Allergic Mechanisms of Asthma in 2008 alone were awarded 'Centre of Excellence' status by the British Heart Foundation with funding of £9 million and a £4 million Breakthrough Breast Cancer Unit was opened in 2009.[9]
The School is also host to its own 'Centre of Medical Law and Ethics', the first of its kind in the UK,[10] and in March 2009, the school was accredited as an Academic health science centre, one of only five in the UK.[11]
Like other medical schools in the UK, KCLMS has its own sports teams which compete in various student sports leagues and tournaments. Despite officially being called 'KCLMS', the teams are still widely known as 'GKT'.
Like most other universities in London GKT sports teams take part in the BUCS leagues and cups and the ULU leagues and cups. The GKT teams also take part in the United Hospitals Cup, which is a sporting competition played between the medical, dental and veterinary schools of London in all sports. The two most popular and biggest of the competitions include the United Hospitals Bumps (rowing) and the men's rugby. The GKT men's 1st VIII has held the bumps headship for the past 5 years running and, in 2009, the GKT men's, women's and alumni crews won 7 of the 8 bumps classes. In recent history the rugby final has often been contested between GKT and Imperial College School of Medicine.
GKT has a fierce sporting rivalry with King's College London. This rivalry led to the founding of the Macadam Cup in 2004, which pits GKT and KCL sports teams against each other and includes events ranging from hockey to darts.[12] As of 2010, King's College London has yet to win the Macadam Cup, leading to chants of "You'll never win Macadam".
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