The evolution of orthopaedic surgeons from bone and joint surgery at the University of Pennsylvania.

Abstract

When the first medical school in the North American colonies was founded in 1765 at the Philadelphia College (University of Pennsylvania) there were only two branches of medicine physic (medicine) and surgery. Surgeons such as Philip Syng Physick, and his successors William Gibson, Henry Hollingsworth Smith, and D. Hayes Agnew, in addition to performing general surgery, treated patients with orthopaedic, ophthalmologic, and nuerosurgical problems. Treatment of patients with orthopaedic problems by surgeons continued at the University of Pennsylvania until DeForest Willard founded the Department of Orthopaedics in 1889. In the interval between 1805, when Physick was appointed the first professor of surgery at the University of Pennsylvania, and 1889 many ingenious instruments, splints, and operative procedures for treating patients with orthopaedic problems were developed. The author will describe some of the accomplishments of these pioneers.