Howard University College of Medicine

Founders of Howard University appreciated the urgent need for medical education in the District of Columbia after the Civil War. The name of Howard University is in honor of Major General Oliver Otis Howard.[3] The civil war had just ended, and freed African American people were migrating to the nation's capital in large numbers.[3]

The opening exercise for the newly created medical department was held at the First Congregational Church of Christ on November 5, 1868. The charter approving incorporation of Howard University specified that a department would be devoted to medicine. Dr. Silas Loomis, one of the university founders, was named the first dean of the medical department in 1868.[4] Among the first five faculty members was Alexander Thomas Augusta, reportedly the first African American to serve on a medical school faculty in the United States.[3]

The first classes began on November 9, 1868. There were eight students in attendance and the classes were being taught by five faculty members. The faculty members were Drs. Silas Loomis, Robert Reyburn, Joseph Taber Johnson, Lafayette Loomis, and Alexander Thomas Augusta).[5]

In 1869, a building for the medical department and Freedmen's Hospital was constructed by the Freedmen's Bureau on Pomeroy Street, presently Fifth Street NW. The building housed the medical and pharmacy program (and later the dental program), as well as, the Freedmen's Hospital. In 1927, a new facility was constructed on W Street.[4]

The first alumni association for the college was formed in 1871 by the five graduates of that year. The members of the new association were, William Bennit, James Bowen, George Brooks, Danforth Nichols, and Joseph A. Sladen. In 1945, the Howard University Medical Alumni Association (HUMAAA) was incorporated in the District of Columbia.[6]

In September 2020, Michael Bloomberg donated $32.8 million to help lower student debt at the institution.[7]

Howard University College of Medicine has six training programs leading to the M.S. or Ph.D. degrees. These are anatomy, genetics and human genetics, microbiology, biochemistry, pharmacology, and physiology and biophysics.

The largest training program in the college is their four-year M.D. program. HUCM is known for producing physicians who provide healthcare to under-served communities throughout the United States. A major emphasis of HUCM is preparing physicians for under-served communities. Much of the experience these medical students gain with under-served communities is at Howard University Hospital, the primary teaching hospital for HUCM, but students also gain experience with other demographics by working at other hospitals in the D.C. metropolitan area including, Washington Hospital Center, St. Elizabeth's Hospital, and Inova Fairfax Hospital. The community surrounding Howard University Hospital under-served and is promoted as an excellent teaching environment for the HUCM students.

The Howard University Health Sciences Simulation Center opened a major state-of-the-art virtual medical training facility to advance the education of medical students and healthcare professionals. The simulation center, a 6,000-square-foot facility, is a simulated hospital environment that promotes improved communication skills between healthcare workers and their patients.[8]

The college is served by the Louis Stokes Health Sciences Library, named in honor of Louis Stokes, the first African American congressman elected from the state of Ohio.[9]

A long association has existed between Georgetown University and the college. The Georgetown-Howard Universities Center for Clinical and Translational Science (GHUCCTS) promotes clinical research and translational science.[10] This National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded multi-institutional consortium provides improved research infrastructure, inter-institutional collaboration, research on problems of on underserved populations, and educational programs. Senior investigators such as Dr. Thomas O. Obisesan guide teams of students, trainees, and junior faculty in research on high-impact diseases such as dementia.[11] Dr. Thomas Mellman, co-director of the center, pursues innovative research on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).[12]

In conjunction with the New York chapter of the National Organization for the Advancement of Haitians (NOAH) and the Haitian American Alliance, the college has engaged in an ambitious service-learning-based medical project in Haiti. The team from the college consists of physicians from the departments of obstetrics and gynecology, internal medicine, pediatrics, pathology, and anatomy. The team travelled to Haiti as a humanitarian response to the devastating earthquake in 2010.[13]

Former deans of the college are:[14]

• Alexander Thomas Augusta, reportedly the first African American to serve on a medical school faculty in the United States
• Ruth Ella Moore, professor and chair of the microbiology department, researcher, reportedly the first African American woman awarded a Ph.D. in the natural sciences in the United States

• Official website