Harvard Medical School

Coat of arms
Type	Private medical school
Established	September 19, 1782 (1782-09-19)
Parent institution	Harvard University
Dean	George Q. Daley
Academic staff	11,694[1]
Students	Totals: MD – 712 PhD – 915 DMD – 140 Master's – 269 DMSc – 39
Location	Boston , Massachusetts , United States 42°20′13″N 71°06′14″W / 42.33694°N 71.10389°W / 42.33694; -71.10389
Website	hms.harvard.edu

Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the graduate medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical Area in Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is one of the oldest medical schools in the United States.^[2] HMS is affiliated with several teaching hospitals in the Boston area. Affiliated teaching hospitals and research institutes include Dana–Farber Cancer Institute, Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston Children's Hospital, McLean Hospital, Cambridge Health Alliance, The Baker Center for Children and Families, and Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital.^[3]

History

Massachusetts Medical College, Mason Street

Massachusetts Medical College, Grove Street

Harvard Medical School quadrangle in Longwood Medical Area

Harvard Medical School was founded on September 19, 1782, on the initiative of Harvard President Joseph Willard. The founding faculty were John Warren, Aaron Dexter, and Benjamin Waterhouse. It is the third-oldest medical school in the United States, after the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons.

Lectures were first held in the basement of Harvard Hall, then in Holden Chapel. Students paid no tuition but purchased tickets to five or six daily lectures.^[2][4] The first two students graduated in 1788.^[2]

In the following century, the school moved locations several times due to changing clinical relationships, a function of the fact that Harvard Medical School does not directly own or operate a teaching hospital.^[5] In 1810, the school moved to Boston at what is now downtown Washington Street. In 1816, the school was moved to Mason Street and was called the Massachusetts Medical College of Harvard University in recognition of a gift from the Great and General Court of Massachusetts. In 1847, the school was moved to Grove Street to be closer to Massachusetts General Hospital. In 1883, the school was relocated to Copley Square.^[2] Before this move, Charles William Eliot became Harvard's president in 1869 and found the medical school in the worst condition of any part of the university. He instituted drastic reforms that raised admissions standards, instituted a formal degree program, and defined HMS as a professional school within Harvard University that laid the groundwork for its transformation into one of the leading medical schools in the world.^[4]

In 1906, the school moved to its present location in the Longwood Medical and Academic Area.^[2][6]

Innovations

Harvard Medical School postdoctoral trainees and faculty have been associated with several important medical and public health innovations:^[2]

Broadening admissions

Women

In mid-1847, professor Walter Channing's proposal that women be admitted to lectures and examinations was rejected by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. While Harriot Kezia Hunt was soon after given permission to attend medical lectures, this permission was withdrawn in 1850.

In 1866, two women with extensive medical education elsewhere applied but were denied admission. In 1867, a single faculty member's vote blocked the admission of Susan Dimock. In 1872, Harvard declined a gift of $10,000 conditioned on medical school admitting women medical students on the same terms as men. A similar offer of $50,000, by a group of ten women including Marie Elizabeth Zakrzewska, was declined in 1882; a committee of five was appointed to study the matter. After the medical school moved from North Grove Street to Boylston Street in 1883, professor Henry Ingersoll Bowditch's proposal that the North Grove Street premises be used for medical education for women was rejected.

In 1943, a dean's committee recommended the admission of women, the proportion of men and women being dependent solely on the qualifications of the applicants.^[8] In 1945, the first class of women was admitted; projected benefits included helping male students learn to view women as equals, increasing the number of physicians in lower-paid specialties typically shunned by men, and replacing the weakest third of all-male classes with better-qualified women.^[9] By 1972, about one-fifth of Harvard medical students were women.^[8]

African Americans

In 1850, three black men, Martin Delany, Daniel Laing Jr., and Isaac H. Snowden, were admitted to the school but were later expelled under pressure from faculty and other students.

In 1968, in response to a petition signed by hundreds of medical students, the faculty established a commission on relations with the black community in Boston; at the time less than one percent of Harvard medical students were black. By 1973, the number of black students admitted had tripled, and by the next year, it had quadrupled.^[8] In 2011, HMS appointed its first African American full professor of medicine, Valerie E. Stone.^[10] That year they also appointed their first African-American professor of radiology, Stone's former classmate Tina Young Poussaint.^[10]

In 2019 LaShyra Nolen was the first black woman to be elected class president of Harvard Medical School.^[11]

2018—2022 Anatomical Gifts morgue scandal

On June 14, 2023, the morgue manager for the Anatomical Gifts Program at Harvard Medical School, Cedric Lodge, along with his associates, were criminally charged with theft of human organs by the U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania^[12] 12 lawsuits were subsequently filed against the school by families of Lodge's victims.^[13] In January 17, 2024, lawyer representing Harvard urged Suffolk County Superior Court Judge Kenneth Salinger to dismiss the lawsuits.^[13]

Medical education

Curriculum

Harvard Medical School has gone through many curricular revisions for its MD program. In recent decades, HMS has maintained a three-phase curriculum with a classroom-based pre-clerkship phase, a principal clinical experience (PCE), and a post-PCE phase.^[14]

The pre-clerkship phase has two curricular tracks. The majority of students enter the more traditional Pathways track that focuses on active learning and earlier entry into the clinic with courses that include students from the Harvard School of Dental Medicine. Pathways students gain early exposure to the clinic through a longitudinal clinical skills course that lasts the duration of the pre-clerkship phase. A small portion of each class enters the HST track, which is jointly administered with MIT. The HST track is designed to train physician-scientists with an emphasis on basic physiology and quantitative understanding of biological processes through courses that include Ph.D. students from MIT.

Admissions

Admission to Harvard Medical School's MD program is highly selective. There are 165 total spots for each incoming class, with 135 spots in the Pathways curriculum and 30 spots in the HST program.^[15] While both use a single application, each curricular track independently evaluates applicants.

For the MD Class of 2023, 6,815 candidates applied, and 227 were admitted (3.3%). There was a matriculation rate of 73%.^[1] For the Master of Medical Sciences (MMSc) program in Global Health Delivery, the Fall 2020 admissions rate was (8.2%).

Graduate education

PhD degree programs

There are nine PhD programs based in Harvard Medical School.^[16] Students in these programs are all enrolled in the Division of Medical Sciences in Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) and are part of the HILS (Harvard Integrated Life Sciences) inter-program federation.^[17]

Master's degree programs

Harvard Medical School offers two types of master's degrees, Master of Medical Sciences (MMSc) degrees and Master of Science (MS) degrees.^[18]

Postgraduate certificate programs

Harvard Medical School offers several Postgraduate Certificate programs.^[19] These graduate-level programs may run up to twelve months. Admitted participants are awarded a Certificate from Harvard Medical School upon successful completion, and are eligible for associate membership in the Harvard Alumni Association.^[20]

Affiliated teaching hospitals and research institutes

Harvard Medical School does not directly own or operate any hospitals and instead relies on affiliated teaching hospitals for clinical education. Medical students primarily complete their clinical experiences at the following hospitals.^[21] Clinical faculty at Harvard Medical School generally hold a concurrent appointment as a physician or a surgeon at one of the affiliated hospitals. Basic science faculty at Harvard Medical School may hold the primary appointment at the School itself or one of the affiliated hospitals.

Notable alumni

There are over 10,425 alumni.^[1] It has trained more Nobel Prize winners in Medicine and Physiology than any other medical school.