schools and the Michigan State Medical Society, was assigned to study the problem for a year and report at a similar joint conference at the next annual meeting of the council. The committee was composed of Dr. Carl D. Camp, Dr. Douglas Donald, and Dr. James D. Bruce, chairman.
The committee presented its report in February, 1927. It expressed the opinion that the obligation to inaugurate and maintain a program of postgraduate education should be assumed by the University because of its state support. It was further stated in the report:
The committee recommended that a Department of Postgraduate Medicine in the Medical School of the University of Michigan be established to direct these activities. A tentative schedule of study periods was suggested.This does not mean that all postgraduate medical study should be conducted at the University Medical School and Hospital. There are many centers in this state and nation distinguished for special attainments in the various departments of medicine which should be made accessible for postgraduate study, and to which physicians should be recommended and sent for advanced and special work. The University Medical School, in which postgraduate study in medicine is offered and administered, should seek and maintain the closest co-operation with those extramural centers with a view of utilizing their facilities. Physicians in these centers who have distinguished themselves might be invited to become extramural members of the faculty of postgraduate medical instruction.
Journ. Mich. Med. Soc.
The council and the two medical schools were in complete accord with the recommendations. Dean W. H. MacCraken and Dr. A. P. Biddle, representing the Detroit College of Medicine and Surgery, stated that the Detroit College could assume neither direction nor financial support, but promised the co-operation of its faculty, together with the use of laboratories and buildings, if and when any part of the program should be developed in Detroit. Dr. Little, on the part of the University, promised to place the matter before the Board of Regents with his approval. This he did in a communication to the Board on June 17, 1927, proposing the establishment of a Division of Postgraduate Medicine. In the absence of Regent Sawyer the matter was laid upon the table for consideration at the next meeting of the Board, June 24, at which time the following action was recorded:
The direction of the program has been shared since its beginning by committees representing the profession, the Council of the Michigan State Medical Society and the Wayne County Medical Society.The subject of post-graduate medical courses was taken from the table… The Board approved the establishment, within the Medical School, of a Department of Post-Graduate Medicine and named Dr. James D. Bruce as the head thereof, without additional salary, with the provision that during the year 1927-28 a beginning would be made toward placing the work of this department in operation. The organization of the Department of Post-Graduate Medicine is to proceed, under the charge of Dr. Bruce and under the usual conditions governing a department of the Medical School …
R.P.
The first postgraduate courses were given May 27 to June 24, 1929, at the Receiving Hospital, Hermann Kiefer Hospital, and Children's Hospital in Detroit. Twenty-four doctors registered for the course in internal medicine and twenty for the surgery course. In 1938-39, the tenth year of this program, fifteen short, intensive courses in various fields of medical practice were given in Detroit and Ann Arbor. Extramural teaching programs of eight days each were given in various centers: Saginaw, Battle
