We have over 200 years of tradition and experience in teaching medicine behind us
The history of medical education in Warsaw spans over 200 years of tradition and experience.
Medical education at the university level in Warsaw dates back to the early 19th century. In 1809, a royal decree by Frederick Augustus, issued in Dresden, established the Faculty of Medicine and the General Medical Council, whose task was to work on the "improvement and dissemination of medical knowledge in the Duchy of Warsaw." Shortly afterward, a plan for the curriculum and internal organization of the school was approved. The medical studies were set at four years, and two-year chemical-pharmaceutical courses were also created. The dean was Hiacynt Dziarkowski, and a few months later, Stanisław Staszic became the president of the Academic Medical Faculty. Teaching was conducted in Polish, with Polish textbooks and medical terminology created.
In 1816, Tsar Alexander I established the Royal University of Warsaw, which consisted of five faculties. The former Medical School, established in 1809, was incorporated into the new university. The Medical Faculty was located on Jezuicka Street. It was closed in 1831 as part of the repressive measures after the November Uprising.
In 1857, the Imperial-Royal Medical and Surgical Academy was founded, with Fyodor Cycurin as its president. Its main seat was at Staszic Palace, and the most important clinical base was the Children’s Hospital. In 1862, the Academy was dissolved, and the Main School of Warsaw was established, led by rector Józef Mianowski. The Main School had four faculties, including the Medical Faculty, with Polish as the language of instruction and Polish professors.
In 1869, the school was transformed into the Imperial University of Warsaw with Russian as the language of instruction. The Medical Faculty, as well as the entire university, gradually underwent complete Russification. In 1905, under the banner of the fight for a Polish university, a boycott of the Russian institution was declared. The number of Polish students dropped below 10%, with most of the former students leaving to study at other universities. The Imperial University of Warsaw lasted until July 7, 1915.
The first years of the Faculty were very difficult, with a lack of independent academic staff and funds to establish laboratories and departments. The following theoretical departments were created at that time: Anatomy, Physiology, Physiological Chemistry, Histology and Embryology, Hygiene and Bacteriology, General and Experimental Pathology, Biological Toxicology, Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Microbiology and Serology, Experimental Pharmacology, Forensic Medicine, Radiology, and the History of Medicine. However, the most difficult task was the organization of clinical bases, which included the St. Spirit Hospital and the Children’s Hospital. They housed internal medicine and surgical clinics, as well as the Gynecology-Obstetrics Clinic, Neurology Clinic, Ophthalmology Clinic, and Otolaryngology Clinic. The Dermatology Clinic was located on Koszykowa Street, the Psychiatry Clinic on Konwiktorska Street, and the Pediatrics Clinic occupied buildings on Marszałkowska and Litewska Streets.
The fully functioning Medical Faculty was organized within four years. This was largely due to outstanding Polish professors who moved to Warsaw from universities in Russia, Galicia, and Western Europe.
During World War II, after the German occupation closed universities, several secret institutions were established in Warsaw to teach medicine at the university level. Among them was the Private Vocational School for Auxiliary Health Personnel by Jan Zaorski, the Secret University of Western Lands, and the Medical Studies Program, which in 1943 became the Secret Medical Faculty of the University of Warsaw with a secret Faculty Council. Students were taught both theoretical and clinical subjects, and the secret institutions collaborated with each other.
In 1944, as the Warsaw Uprising was ongoing on the left bank of the Vistula River, for safety reasons, patients from the Przemienienia Pańskiego Hospital on the Praga side were transferred to a large school building at Boremlowska Street. Despite the refusal of the Lubelski Ministry of Education of the Polish Committee of National Liberation (PKWN), created by the Soviet authorities in Poland, docent Tadeusz Butkiewicz, head of the surgical department at Przemienienia Pańskiego Hospital, was appointed dean, and on November 1, 1944, classes for third, fourth, and fifth-year students began. Eventually, PKWN recognized the Boremlowska Academy, as it was informally called, as a "partial Medical Faculty" and appointed docent Butkiewicz as its head.
In the summer of 1945, the Medical Faculty was relocated from Boremlowska Street to the university's main campus, where the theoretical medicine building was being rebuilt. The Faculty also received the Collegium Anatomicum building on Chałubińskiego Street. The clinical base of the Faculty consisted of the Children’s Hospital and Przemienienia Pańskiego Hospital. Of the 23 pre-war professors, only 11 survived the war. In 1945, the Dental Academy was revived and, in 1949, incorporated into the Medical Faculty as the Dental Department.
In 1950, the Medical Faculty and the Faculty of Pharmacy were separated from the University of Warsaw and formed a new Medical Academy, which was renamed the Medical Academy later that year. The Academy inherited the theoretical medicine building on Krakowskie Przedmieście, the Anatomicum building on Chałubińskiego Street, the Department of Forensic Medicine on Oczki Street, two Pharmaceutical Faculty buildings on Oczki and Przemysłowa Streets, and the building on Filtrowa Street, which housed the Rectorate until 2000. The clinical base of the Faculty included the Children’s Hospital and a children’s hospital located on Litewska Street.
In 1950, as part of the Medical Faculty of the Medical Academy, the Pediatric Department was established in response to the post-war shortage of doctors, particularly pediatricians. Thanks to expanded pediatric courses in the fourth and fifth years, graduates received a first-degree specialization diploma in pediatrics. The clinical base of the Pediatric Department was the hospital on Działdowska Street, which continued the pre-war tradition of the Karol and Maria Children’s Hospital. The head of the department was Professor Władysław Szenajch, the former chief physician of the hospital. The Pediatric Department operated until 1970.
In 1975, the newly built Central Clinical Hospital on Banacha Street opened and became the main clinical base for the Medical Faculty. At that time, it was the most modern clinical hospital in Poland.
The creation of a new faculty for medical students in 1975, called the Second Medical Faculty, led to a change in the name of the previous one, which became the First Medical Faculty.
In 2008, the name of the institution was changed, and the First Medical Faculty became the First Medical Faculty of the Warsaw Medical University (WUM).
Between 2002 and 2011, the First Medical Faculty introduced new programs of study: Electroradiology, Audiophonology with Hearing Prosthetics, and General and Clinical Logopedics, the latter being jointly run with the Faculty of Polish Studies at the University of Warsaw.
In 2012, the Department of Dentistry was separated from the First Medical Faculty to create an independent faculty.
In 2019, the merger of the two medical faculties resulted in the formation of the Medical Faculty at WUM.