Cardiff University School of Medicine Information

The Cardiff University School of Medicine (Welsh: Ysgol Feddygaeth Prifysgol Caerdydd) is the medical school of Cardiff University and is located in Cardiff, Wales, UK. Founded in 1893 as part of the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire, it is the older of the two medical schools in Wales.

It is one of the largest medical schools in the United Kingdom, employing nearly 500 academic and 300 support staff; and with over 1000 undergraduate and 1100 postgraduate students enrolled on medical and scientific courses. The school has an annual financial turnover of over £50 million, of which nearly half comes from competitive external research funding. The school is based at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff.

The medical school was founded as Cardiff Medical School in 1893 when the Departments of Anatomy, Physiology and Pharmacology were established at University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire (now Cardiff University).

The opening ceremony took place on 14 February 1894 at the College buildings on Dumfries Place and was conducted by John Viriamu Jones, Principal of the College, and Richard Quain, President of the General Medical Council. During the ceremony professors of the new medical school encouraged it to emulate the recent advances in medical education at the University of Heidelberg. The first Dean of the school was Alfred W. Hughes of Corris.

A department of Pathology and Bacteriology was added in 1910. Students finishing their preclinical studies at Cardiff went on to other medical schools for their clinical studies, many going to University College Hospital in London, part of University College London.

In 1921 it became a clinical and pre-clinical medical school with the name of the Welsh National School of Medicine, and in 1931 it became an independent institution of the University of Wales. The name was further changed in 1984, to University of Wales College of Medicine.

In 2002, ideas were floated to re-merge Cardiff with the University of Wales College of Medicine (UWCM) following the publication of the Welsh Assembly Governments review of higher education in Wales. This merger became effective on 1 August 2004, on which date Cardiff University ceased to be a constituent institution of the University of Wales and became an independent "link institution" affiliated to the federal University. The process of the merger was completed on 1 December 2004 when the Act of Parliament transferring UWCMs assets to Cardiff University received Royal Assent. On 17 December it was announced that the Privy Council had given approval to the new Supplemental Charter and had granted university status to Cardiff, legally changing the name of the institution to Cardiff University. Cardiff awarded University of Wales degrees to students admitted before 2005, but these have been replaced by Cardiff degrees. Medicine, dentistry and other health-related areas began to admit students for Cardiff degrees in 2006.

In 2004, Cardiff University and the Swansea University entered a partnership to provide a four-year graduate-entry medical degree. An annual intake of around 70 post-graduate students undertook an accelerated version of the Cardiff course at the Swansea University for the first two years before joining undergraduate students at Cardiff for the final two years. However, from September 2010 Swansea University began independently providing medical education in a revised 4-yr Graduate Entry Degree.

In 2005, The Wales College of Medicine, which is part of the University, launched the North Wales Clinical School in Wrexham in collaboration with the North East Wales Institute of Higher Education in Wrexham and Bangor University, previously University of Wales, Bangor, and with the National Health Service in Wales. This has been funded with £12.5 million from the Welsh Assembly and will lead to the trebling of the number of trainee doctors in clinical training in Wales over a four-year period.

By 2008 the medical school it had an intake of some 305 British medical students per year and an additional 25 students from overseas.

In November 2011 Cardiff University’s School of Medicine officially opened the Cochrane Building, a health education centre offering students the latest teaching, library and simulation facilities. The Centres facilities include a Clinical Skills Centre, a high-technology medical simulation centre and a new library. The Cochrane Building provides teaching and learning facilities for all healthcare schools based on the Heath Park Campus and is named after the University’s medical pioneer, Archie Cochrane.

In 2012, Cardiff University’s School of Medicine and Meducation hosted the Wales Medical Undergraduate Conference, the first national undergraduate medical conference held in Wales, with over 100 posters, and 15 oral presentations taking place and attendees from throughout Europe.

The school’s major undergraduate programme is the MBBCh in Medicine.

Clinical placements occurs in partnership with over a dozen NHS Trusts and over 150 general practices, covering the whole of Wales.

C21 Curriculum

In 2013, Cardiff School of Medicine launched a major redevelopment of its undergraduate medical education programme. C21 resulted from a comprehensive review of the undergraduate curriculum, its delivery and the supporting structures, mechanisms and processes and improve the quality of the medical education delivered at Cardiff University.Led by the Division of Medical Education, and in partnership with colleagues from across the University, student and patient representatives, the NHS and Welsh Assembly Government, C21 consisted of 5 coordinated projects.

Intercalated programmes

Some undergraduate students have the opportunity to undertake an intercalated year at the end of Year 3 or Year 4 of the course.

Post-graduate taught (PGT) schemes

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