Originally set up as The Medical and Chirurgical Society of London in 1805, members of this important collective met in Gray’s Inn, moving shortly afterwards to Lincoln’s Inn Fields. The society was granted a Royal Charter in the 1830s by King William IV. A further move to Hanover Square, in 1905, marked the first anniversary of the society. Later, in 1907, the society merged with a number of highly respected medical organisations and, with a subsequent Royal Charter, granted by Edward VII, it changed its name to the Royal Society of Medicine. The present site, at 1 Wimpole Street, was opened by King George V in 1912: at that time, the building was on the corner of Henrietta Place and Wimpole Street. However, over the years, the Royal Society of Medicine acquired more space in order to house meeting rooms, offices, a large library and various auditoria. The Royal Society of Medicine has always been a centre for medical and scientific research. Past Honorary Fellows include Charles Darwin, Edward Jenner, Sigmund Freud and Louis Pasteur. There has also been a number of past presidents who have had diseases named after them. These include: Thomas Addison, Joseph Hodgson and Sir James Paget. The Royal Society of Medicine (RSM) offers a huge range of postgraduate medical education to health professionals. It also runs over four-hundred academic and public events each year. In addition, there are fifty-six sections within the society which focus on specific areas of medicine.
For more information on events and training at the RSM, please go to https://www.rsm.ac.uk/
David Kraft PhD