St Thomas' Hospital | |
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King's Health Partners Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust | |
Geography | |
Location | Westminster Bridge Road London, SE1 7EH, England |
Organisation | |
Care system | NHS England |
Type | Teaching |
Affiliated university | King's College London GKT School of Medical Education |
Services | |
Emergency department | Yes |
Beds | 840 [1] |
Speciality | Dermatology, cardiothoracic surgery, obstetrics and gynaecology, children's services (Evelina London Children's Hospital), critical care, clinical pharmacology, cancer services, dentistry, urology, sexual health |
Public transit access | Westminster Waterloo Lambeth North |
History | |
Opened | circa 1100 |
Links | |
Website | guysandstthomas |
Lists | Hospitals in England |
St Thomas' Hospital is a large NHS teaching hospital in Central London, England. Administratively part of the Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust, together with Guy's Hospital, Evelina London Children's Hospital, Royal Brompton Hospital and other sites. It is also a member of King's Health Partners, an academic health science centre, and is one of three sites used by King's College London GKT School of Medical Education.
The hospital was established in the Middle Ages and named for St Thomas Becket. Originally located in Southwark, but based in Lambeth since 1871, the hospital has provided healthcare freely or under charitable auspices since the 12th century. It is one of London's most famous hospitals, associated with people such as Sir Astley Cooper, William Cheselden, Florence Nightingale, Alicia Lloyd Still, Linda Richards, Edmund Montgomery, Agnes Elizabeth Jones and Sir Harold Ridley. It is a prominent London landmark – largely due to its location on the opposite bank of the River Thames to the Houses of Parliament.
St Thomas' Hospital is accessible from Westminster tube station (a 10-minute walk across Westminster Bridge), Waterloo station (tube and national rail, also a 10-minute walk) and Lambeth North tube station (another 10-minute walk).
The hospital was described as ancient in 1215 [2] [3] [4] and was named after St Thomas Becket – which suggests it may have been founded after 1173 when Becket was canonised. [2] This date was when it was relocated from the precinct of St Mary Overie Priory to "Trenet Lane", then later to St Thomas Street. [2] However, it is possible it was only renamed in 1173 and that there was an infirmary at the priory when it was founded at Southwark in 1106. [3] [2]
Originally the hospital was run by a mixed order of Augustinian canons regular and canonesses regular, dedicated to St Thomas Becket, and provided shelter and treatment for the poor, sick, and homeless. [2] In the 15th century, Richard Whittington endowed a lying-in ward for unmarried mothers. The monastery was dissolved in 1539 during the Reformation and the hospital closed but reopened in 1551 and rededicated to Thomas the Apostle. [3] [2] This was due to the efforts of the City of London who obtained the grant of the site and a charter of 1553 from Edward VI (26th June, 7 Edw. VI) establishing three institutions Bridewell Hospital, Christ's Hospital and St Thomas' Hospital. The hospital has remained open ever since. [5]
The hospital was also where one of the first printed English Bibles was produced in 1537, and this is commemorated by a plaque on the surviving wing in Borough High Street. The plaque inaccurately refers to "the first printed Bible in English" rather than "one of the first". [6]
There were some twenty-four priors, masters, wardens or rectors who served between the foundation of the hospital and the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1539. [7]
Dr. Eleazar Hodson was the first St Thomas' physician about whom the medical historian Joseph Frank Payne was able to find any precise information. Hodson received his medical degree at Padua in 1612 and became F.R.C.P. in 1618. [8] At the end of the 17th century, the hospital and church were largely rebuilt by Sir Robert Clayton, president of the hospital and a former Lord Mayor of London. Thomas Cartwright was the architect for the work. A statue of Clayton now stands at the north entrance to Ward Block of North Wing at St Thomas' Hospital and is Grade I listed. [9] In 1721 Sir Thomas Guy, a governor of St Thomas', founded Guy's Hospital as a place to treat 'incurables' discharged from St Thomas'. [10]
Saint Thomas's Hospital Act 1862 | |
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Act of Parliament | |
Long title | An Act to enable the Mayor and Commonalty and Citizens of the City of London, Governors of the Possessions, Revenues, and Goods of the Hospital of Edward, late King of England the Sixth, of Saint Thomas the Apostle, commonly called "Saint Thomas's Hospital," to convey the Site of the present Hospital to the Charing Cross Railway Company, and to acquire a new Site for the same Hospital; and for other Purposes. |
Citation | 25 & 26 Vict. c. 4 |
Dates | |
Royal assent | 7 August 1862 |
Text of statute as originally enacted |
Some parts of the old St Thomas' Hospital survive on the north side of St Thomas Street, Southwark including the old St. Thomas' Church, now used mostly as offices but including the Old Operating Theatre, which is now a museum. [11] However the hospital left Southwark in 1862, when its ancient site was compulsorily purchased to make way for the construction of the Charing Cross railway viaduct from London Bridge Station. [12] The hospital was temporarily housed at Royal Surrey Gardens in Newington (Walworth) until new buildings on the present site in Lambeth near Lambeth Palace were completed in 1871. [13]
The present-day St Thomas' Hospital is located at a site historically known as Stangate in the London Borough of Lambeth. It is directly across the River Thames from the Palace of Westminster on a plot of land largely reclaimed from the river during construction of the Albert Embankment in the late 1860s. The new buildings were designed by Henry Currey and the foundation stone was laid by Queen Victoria in 1868. [14] There was a seventh pavilion at the north end of the site next to Westminster Bridge Road for the "Treasurer's House" (hospital offices). [14] The hospital initially had 600 beds. [14]
This was one of the first new hospitals to adopt the "pavilion principle" – popularised by Florence Nightingale in her Notes on Nursing – by having six separate ward buildings at right angles to the river frontage set 125 feet apart and linked by low corridors. The intention was primarily to improve ventilation and to separate and segregate patients with infectious diseases. [15]
An urban legend suggests that by convention, deaths in the Palace of Westminster are recorded as occurring in St Thomas' Hospital, because it is technically a royal palace, and as such people who die there would be entitled to a state funeral. [16] This is not true, since state funerals for any person other than a sovereign require an order from the reigning monarch as well as a parliamentary vote to authorise the funding. [17]
A similar myth suggests that the place of death is changed because a death in a royal palace would require an inquest from the Coroner of the Queen's Household and a hearing before a jury of members of the Royal Household. Although the position of Coroner of the Queen's Household was abolished by the Coroners and Justice Act 2009, [18] in the past the Coroner was responsible for inquests where the victim was "lying within the limits of the Queen's palaces", [19] which would have included the Palace of Westminster. However, there is no proof that deaths at Westminster were ever reported as happening at St Thomas' Hospital to avoid involving the Coroner. When Sir Alfred Billson died in the House of Commons in 1907, his death was recorded as occurring in the House and not at St Thomas' Hospital. [16]
The hospital was requisitioned by the War Office in 1914 to create the 5th London General Hospital, a facility for the Royal Army Medical Corps to treat military casualties. [20]
The northern part of the hospital site was severely damaged during the Second World War, with three ward blocks destroyed. Limited reconstruction began in the 1950s including the building now known as East Wing. Complete rebuilding to a more ambitious plan to designs by Yorke Rosenberg Mardall was agreed on in the 1960s requiring the realignment of Lambeth Palace Road further away from the river to enlarge the hospital campus. The new buildings have white-tiled cladding, which was a characteristic of several other university and hospital buildings designed by that practice. [21]
As construction of the thirteen storey block (now North Wing) was completed by John Laing & Sons in 1975 [22] there was a widespread public reaction against the scale and appearance of this building – most notably from MPs who could see it from the river terrace of the Palace of Westminster. The southern part of the redevelopment, which would have included a second tall block, was never constructed. The three remaining Victorian ward pavilion blocks were refurbished in the 1980s. They are now Grade II listed buildings. [23]
In November 1949, in an operating theatre in St Thomas' Hospital, Harold Ridley achieved the world's first implantation of an intraocular lens (IOL), treating a cataract in a 49-year-old female patient. In later life Ridley himself underwent successful bilateral intraocular lens implantation at St Thomas's. What was most pleasing to him was that he had the operation done in the same hospital where he had performed the first operation in 1949. [24] Ridley was subsequently made a Knight Bachelor "for pioneering services to cataracts surgery". [25]
With the closure of the Dreadnought Seamen's Hospital at the Greenwich Hospital in 1986, services for seamen and their families are provided by the Dreadnought Unit at St Thomas' Hospital. It allows eligible merchant seafarers access to priority medical treatment, except cardiac surgery, and is funded by central government with money separate from other NHS trust funds. It originally consisted of two 28-bed wards, but nowadays Dreadnought patients are treated according to clinical need and so are placed in the ward most suitable for their medical condition. [26]
Following the merger of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals into one trust, accident and emergency services were consolidated at St Thomas' Hospital in 1993. [27] Former prime minister Harold Wilson died at the hospital on 24 May 1995, as a result of cancer and Alzheimer's disease. [28] In the late 1980s Dr Chris Aps introduced changes at St Thomas' Hospital which allowed cardiothoracic surgical patients to recover away from the intensive care unit in an overnight intensive recovery unit: this has become a template for similar units across the United Kingdom. [29] In October 2005 children's departments moved to new facilities designed by Michael Hopkins at Evelina London Children's Hospital to the south-east of St Thomas' Hospital. [30]
As the situation in Wuhan deteriorated, at the end of January 2020, four hospital trusts in the UK, including St Thomas' and The Royal Free were put on standby to receive suspected patients. [31]
After testing positive to COVID-19 on 27 March, Prime Minister Boris Johnson was admitted to St Thomas' on 5 April and as his condition deteriorated, he was moved to intensive care later that day. [32] [33] He was moved out of intensive care on 9 April and discharged 3 days later. [34]
The current main pedestrian entrance is in Westminster Bridge Road, although there is a separate vehicle and A&E entrance in Lambeth Palace Road; there is also a riverside pedestrian entrance, and the Lane Fox Unit (chronic respiratory problems) has its own riverside entrance, mainly for the use of patients on the Lane Fox Ward. The pedestrian entrance to the campus leads to a glazed link between the Lambeth Wing and the North Wing. Guy's and St Thomas' Charity commissioned sculptor Rick Kirby to produce a sculpture "Cross the Divide", and this was unveiled in 2000 outside the Main Entrance. [35] To the north of the North Wing (closer to Westminster Bridge Road) there is a garden area above car parking with Naum Gabo's fountain sculpture Revolving Torsion at its centre. [36]
Tommy's is a UK-based charity that funds research into pregnancy problems and provides information to parents. The charity believes that it is unacceptable that one in four women in the UK will lose a baby during pregnancy and birth. It started when two obstetricians working in the maternity unit at the hospital were inspired to start fundraising for more research into pregnancy problems. It funds three research centres in the UK, including St Thomas' in London, Saint Mary's Hospital, Manchester, and the recently established Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. [37]
The use of the plural genitive s' in place of the singular genitive s's is fairly recent. The hospital newsletter in 2004 claimed that plural s' is grammatically correct, as "there are two men called St Thomas linked to the hospital's history: Thomas Becket and Thomas the Apostle". [38] A hospital belonging to two men, both called Thomas, would be Thomases', so the name change in the late 20th century is considered by some to be a simple mistake. [39]
Within the South Wing of the hospital there are a number of late Victorian brass plaques headed "St Thomas's Hospital" i.e. using singular genitive. However, the medical school used the singular genitive s's; the explanation given for this was that as the medical school of the hospital it was called "St Thomas's Hospital Medical School" (although following this logic it should perhaps have been called "St Thomas's Hospital's Medical School"). [40]
St Thomas's Hospital Medical School was established in 1550. Following the establishment of Guy's Hospital as a separate institution, this continued as a single medical school, commonly known as The Borough Hospitals, with teaching across St Thomas' and Guy's Hospitals. Following a dispute over the successor to the Surgeon Astley Cooper, Guy's established its own separate medical school in 1825. [41]
The medical school subsequently remerged in 1982 with that at Guy's to form the United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals (UMDS). Subsequent additions included the Royal Dental Hospital of London School of Dental Surgery joining with Guy's Dental School on 1 August 1983 and St John's Institute of Dermatology on 1 August 1985. [41] The latter had previously been located at 5 Lisle Street in Soho. [42]
Following discussion held between 1990 and 1992 with King's College London and the King's College London Act 1997, the UMDS merged in 1998 with King's College School of Medicine and Dentistry to form as The Guy's, Kings & Thomas' Schools of Medicine (GKT School of Medicine), of Dentistry and of Biomedical Sciences. [41] This was renamed as King's College London School of Medicine and Dentistry at Guy's, King's and St Thomas' Hospitals in 2005. [43]
The Nightingale Training School and Home for Nurses opened at St Thomas' Hospital on 9 July 1860 under Matron Sarah Elizabeth Wardroper, [44] endowed from the publicly donated Fund raised after the Crimean War to honour Florence Nightingale. [45] Alicia LLoyd Still (matron of the hospital and superintendent of the training school from 1913 to 1937) created the first post of sister tutor, setting a model internationally. [46] Notable alumini of the training school included: Dorothy Bannon, (Chief Matron-in-Charge of the Hospital and School Nursing Service of the London County Council from 1929 to 1940); [47] Dame Barbara Cozens (Matron-in-Chief and Director of Army Nursing Services from 1960 to 1964), [48] and Theodora Turner (Matron at St. Thomas' 1955 to 1965 and President of the Royal College of Nursing 1966 to 1968.) [49]
The school merged with other training schools in the 1990s, then became the Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care, part of King's College London. [50]
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GKT School of Medical Education is the medical school of King's College London. The school has campuses at three institutions, Guy's Hospital (Southwark), King's College Hospital and St Thomas' Hospital (Lambeth) in London – with the initial of each hospital making up the acronymous name of the school. The school in its current guise was formed following a merger with the United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals on 1 August 1998. As of 2023, the medical school is ranked 5th best in the UK for clinical medicine by U.S. News & World Report, and 10th best worldwide by Times Higher Education.
King's College London is a public research university located in London, England. King's was established by royal charter in 1829 under the patronage of King George IV and the Duke of Wellington. In 1836, King's became one of the two founding colleges of the University of London. It is one of the oldest university-level institutions in England. In the late 20th century, King's grew through a series of mergers, including with Queen Elizabeth College and Chelsea College of Science and Technology, the Institute of Psychiatry, the United Medical and Dental Schools of Guy's and St Thomas' Hospitals and the Florence Nightingale School of Nursing and Midwifery.
The Old Operating Theatre Museum and Herb Garret at 9a St Thomas Street is a museum of surgical history and one of the oldest surviving operating theatres. It is located in the garret of St Thomas's Church, Southwark, in London, on the original site of St Thomas' Hospital.
King's College Hospital is a major teaching hospital and major trauma centre in Denmark Hill, Camberwell in the London Borough of Lambeth, referred to locally and by staff simply as "King's" or abbreviated internally to "KCH". It is managed by King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. It serves an inner city population of 700,000 in the London boroughs of Southwark and Lambeth, but also serves as a tertiary referral centre in certain specialties to millions of people in southern England. It is a large teaching hospital and is, with Guy's Hospital and St. Thomas' Hospital, the location of King's College London School of Medicine and one of the institutions that comprise the King's Health Partners, an academic health science centre. The chief executive is Dr Clive Kay. It is also the birthplace of Queen Camilla.
Guy's Hospital is an NHS hospital founded by philanthropist Thomas Guy in 1721, located in the borough of Southwark in central London. It is part of Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust and one of the institutions that comprise the King's Health Partners, an academic health science centre.
Evelina London Children's Hospital is a specialist NHS hospital in London. It is administratively a part of Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust and provides teaching hospital facilities for London South Bank University and King's College London School of Medicine. Formerly housed at Guy's Hospital in Southwark, it moved to a new building alongside St Thomas' Hospital in Lambeth on 31 October 2005.
The Florence Nightingale Museum is located at St Thomas' Hospital, which faces the Palace of Westminster across the River Thames in South Bank, central London, England. It is open to the public five days a week, Wednesday to Sunday 10:00am until 5:00pm.
The Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care is an academic faculty within King's College London. The faculty is the world's first nursing school to be continuously connected to a fully serving hospital and medical school. Established on 9 July 1860 by Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, it was a model for many similar training schools through the UK, Commonwealth and other countries for the latter half of the 19th century. It is primarily concerned with the education of people to become nurses and midwives. It also carries out nursing research, continuing professional development and postgraduate programmes. The Faculty forms part of the Waterloo campus on the South Bank of the River Thames and is now one of the largest faculties in the university.
Westminster Bridge Road is a road in London, England. It runs on an east–west axis and passes through the boroughs of Lambeth and Southwark.
The Seafarers Hospital Society, formerly the Seamen's Hospital Society, is a charity for people currently or previously employed by the British Merchant Navy and fishing fleets, and their families. It was established in 1821.
Dame Alicia Frances Jane Lloyd Still, was a British nurse, teacher, hospital matron and leader of her profession. She was one of the leaders in the campaign for state registration of nurses. Following the Nurses Registration Act 1919, she was a member of the General Nursing Council (1920-1937). As chairwoman of the General Nursing Council's first Education and Examinations Committee she helped establish the first national examination standards for the registration of nurses.
Chief Kofoworola Abeni Pratt Hon. FRCN was a Nigerian nurse who was one of the first notable black nurses to work in Britain's National Health Service. She subsequently became vice-president of the International Council of Nurses and the first black Chief Nursing Officer of Nigeria, working in the Federal Ministry of Health.
Guy's Campus is a campus of King's College London adjacent to Guy's Hospital and situated close to London Bridge and the Shard, on the South Bank of the River Thames in London. It is home to the Faculty of Life Sciences & Medicine and the Dental Institute.
The statue of Robert Clayton stands at the entrance to the North Wing of St Thomas' Hospital, Lambeth, London. The sculptor was Grinling Gibbons, and the statue was executed around 1700–1714. Sir Robert was a banker, politician and Lord Mayor of London. As President of St Thomas', he was responsible for the complete rebuilding of the hospital, and associated church in the late 17th century. The statue was designated a Grade I listed structure in 1979.
Dulwich Community Hospital was a hospital located in Dulwich, in South London.
The statue of Edward VI by Thomas Cartwright at St Thomas' Hospital, Lambeth, London is one of two statues of that king at the hospital. Both commemorate Edward's re-founding of the institution in 1551. The statue was designed by Nathaniel Hanwell and carved by Thomas Cartwright in 1682, during the rebuilding undertaken by Sir Robert Clayton when President of the hospital. The statue originally formed the centrepiece of a group of figures which adorned the gateway on Borough High Street. It was moved to its current location at the north entrance to the North Wing on Lambeth Palace Road in the 20th century. It was designated a Grade II* listed structure in 1979.
The statue of Edward VI by Peter Scheemakers at St Thomas' Hospital, Lambeth, London is one of two statues of the king at the hospital. Both commemorate Edward's re-founding of the hospital in 1551. It was moved to its current location inside the North Wing of the hospital in the 20th century. The sculpture was designated a Grade II* listed structure in 1979.
The statue of Mary Seacole stands in the grounds of St Thomas' Hospital, Lambeth, London. Sculpted by Martin Jennings, the statue was executed in 2016. It honours Mary Seacole, a British-Jamaican who established a "British Hotel" during the Crimean War and who was posthumously voted first in a poll of "100 Great Black Britons".
Eliza Roberts (1802–1878) was an English nurse who was among the first group of nurses to accompany Florence Nightingale to Scutari Hospital during the Crimean War. Nightingale regarded her as the best of her nurses and appointed her Head Nurse.
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