The Royal College of Surgeons is an ancient college (a form of corporation) established in England to regulate the activity of surgeons. Derivative organisations survive in many present and former members of the Commonwealth. These organisations are now also responsible for training surgeons and setting their examinations.
The earliest form of the Royal College of Surgeons was the "Guild of Surgeons Within the City of London" founded in the 14th century. [1] There was dispute between the surgeons and barber surgeons until an agreement was signed between them in 1493, giving the fellowship of surgeons the power of incorporation. [2] The Guild of Barbers of Dublin received a Royal Charter of Henry VI in 1446, making it the earliest Royal Medical incorporation in Great Britain or Ireland. This was followed in 1505 by the incorporation of the Barber Surgeons of Edinburgh as a Craft Guild of Edinburgh. This body was granted a royal charter in 1506 by King James IV of Scotland. It was followed by the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, granted a charter by King by James VI in 1599, as the Glasgow Faculty.
The union in London was formalised further in 1540 by King Henry VIII of England between the Worshipful Company of Barbers (incorporated 1462) and the Guild of Surgeons to form the Company of Barber-Surgeons. In 1745 the surgeons broke away from the barbers to form the Company of Surgeons. In 1800 the Company was granted a Royal Charter to become the Royal College of Surgeons in London. A further charter in 1843 granted it the present title of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. In 2010 Professor Eilis McGovern became president of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and thereby the first female president of any Royal College of Surgeons in the world. [3] [4]
A royal charter is a formal grant issued by a monarch under royal prerogative as letters patent. Historically, they have been used to promulgate public laws, the most famous example being the English Magna Carta of 1215, but since the 14th century have only been used in place of private acts to grant a right or power to an individual or a body corporate. They were, and are still, used to establish significant organisations such as boroughs, universities and learned societies.
The Worshipful Company of Barbers is one of the livery companies of the City of London, and ranks 17th in precedence.
The Royal College of Surgeons of England is an independent professional body and registered charity that promotes and advances standards of surgical care for patients, and regulates surgery and dentistry in England and Wales. The college is located at Lincoln's Inn Fields in London. It publishes multiple medical journals including the Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, the Faculty Dental Journal, and the Bulletin of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
The barber surgeon, one of the most common European medical practitioners of the Middle Ages, was generally charged with caring for soldiers during and after battle. In this era, surgery was seldom conducted by physicians, but instead by barbers, who, possessing razors and dexterity indispensable to their trade, were called upon for numerous tasks ranging from cutting hair to pulling teeth to amputating limbs.
The Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) is a not-for-profit medical professional and educational institution, which is also known as RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences. It was established in 1784 as the national body for the surgical branch of medicine in Ireland, with a role in supervision of training, and as of 2021 provides a broad range of medical education in multiple countries.
The Royal College of Physicians of Ireland (RCPI), is an Irish professional body dedicated to improving the practice of general medicine and related medical specialities, chiefly through the accreditation of physicians by examination.
Fellowship of the Royal Colleges of Surgeons (FRCS) is a professional qualification to practise as a senior surgeon in Ireland or the United Kingdom. It is bestowed on an intercollegiate basis by the four Royal Colleges of Surgeons. The initials may be used as post-nominal letters.
The Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh (RCSEd) is a professional organisation of surgeons. The RCSEd has five faculties, covering a broad spectrum of surgical, dental, and other medical and healthcare specialities. Its main campus is located on Nicolson Street, Edinburgh, centred around the 18th century Surgeons' Hall. The campus includes Surgeons' Hall Museums, a medical and surgical library, a skills laboratory, a symposium hall, administrative offices and a hotel. A second UK office was opened in Birmingham in 2014 and an international office opened in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in 2018.
The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow is an institute of physicians and surgeons in Glasgow, Scotland.
The Faculty of Dental Surgery of the Royal College of Surgeons of England is an independent UK professional body committed to enabling dental specialists to provide patients with the highest possible standards of practice and care. The faculty is an integral part of the Royal College of Surgeons of England and is located at the College's headquarters in Lincoln's Inn Fields in London.
Surgeons' Hall in Edinburgh, Scotland, is the headquarters of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh (RCSEd). It houses the Surgeons' Hall Museum, and the library and archive of the RCSEd. The present Surgeons' Hall was designed by William Henry Playfair and completed in 1832, and is a category A listed building.
In the United Kingdom, some Commonwealth realms and Ireland, a medical royal college is a professional body responsible for the development of and training in one or more medical specialities.
The Apothecaries' Hall of Ireland is one of only two extant successors of a medieval Dublin guild. Apothecaries in Dublin were first organized as members of the 1446 Guild of Barbers, with St Mary Magdelene as the patron saint. In 1747, Apothecaries formed their own guild, with St Luke as the patron. In 1791, the Company of Apothecaries’ Hall was formed for the purposes of building their own Hall and regulating practitioners throughout Ireland. Although the Company ceased licensing doctors in 1971, it continues to exist as a charitable organisation. The Company of Apothecaries’ Hall now shares premises with the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland on Kildare Street, Dublin.
Charles Frederick William Illingworth was a British surgeon who specialised in gastroenterology. Along with a range of teaching and research interests, he wrote several surgical textbooks, and played a leading role in university and medical administration.
Gilbert Primrose was a Scottish surgeon who became Surgeon to King James VI of Scots and moved with the court to London as Serjeant-Surgeon to King James VI and I on the Union of the Crowns. He was Deacon of the Incorporation of Surgeons and Barbers of Edinburgh on three occasions.
Christopher Irvine of Bonshaw was a Scottish physician and surgeon who was the first medically qualified member of the Incorporation of Surgeons and Barbers of Edinburgh. A prolific author, he became historiographer to King Charles II and to King James II and VII.
The Incorporated Trades of Edinburgh are the trade and craft bodies of the City of Edinburgh, Scotland, in much the same way as the Livery companies are in The City of London, but on a much smaller scale. The Incorporations are not "guilds", that term being properly reserved in Scotland for the merchant bodies in the various burghs. The Incorporations have never referred to themselves as guilds; indeed they came into existence, mostly in the latter part of the fifteenth century, in order to counter the growing power of the merchant guild, known as the Royal Company of Merchants of the City of Edinburgh.
Extramural medical education in Edinburgh began over 200 years before the university medical faculty was founded in 1726 and extramural teaching continued thereafter for a further 200 years. Extramural is academic education which is conducted outside a university. In the early 16th century it was under the auspices of the Incorporation of Surgeons of Edinburgh (RCSEd) and continued after the Faculty of Medicine was established by the University of Edinburgh in 1726. Throughout the late 18th and 19th centuries the demand for extramural medical teaching increased as Edinburgh's reputation as a centre for medical education grew. Instruction was carried out by individual teachers, by groups of teachers and, by the end of the 19th century, by private medical schools in the city. Together these comprised the Edinburgh Extramural School of Medicine. From 1896 many of the schools were incorporated into the Medical School of the Royal Colleges of Edinburgh under the aegis of the RCSEd and the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE) and based at Surgeons' Hall. Extramural undergraduate medical education in Edinburgh stopped in 1948 with the closure of the Royal Colleges' Medical School following the Goodenough Report which recommended that all undergraduate medical education in the UK should be carried out by universities.
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