The Medical University of Silesia (Polish: Śląski Uniwersytet Medyczny) is a university located in Katowice, Poland. The university has 10,218 students and a teaching staff of 1201, including 295 professors. There are five faculties: Medicine, Dentistry, Pharmacy, Public Health, Health Sciences (includes degrees in nursing, physical therapy, dietetics). The English divisions in the Faculties of Medicine and Dentistry have 517 and 57 students, respectively 

Overview 

The Medical University of Silesia in Katowice is entering its 70th academic year. Both the jubilee and the change in the status of the university naturally encourage reflection on its history and today, because we are in an undoubtedly important moment for our entire community. On this occasion, it is worth recalling the most important stages of the University's successive development, illustrating its evolution from a single-faculty university with two faculties to the rank of a multi-faculty and multidirectional university center. 

The university was established in 1948 as the Medical Academy with one medical faculty and a dental department based in Rokitnica Bytomska, a year later it was renamed the Silesian Medical Academy, and then the Silesian Medical Academy. Ludwik Waryński. History The university was established as the Akademia Lekarska (English: Medical Academy) upon its establishment on March 20, 1948 in Bytom. 

The name was officially changed to Śląska Akademia Medyczna im. Ludwika Waryńskiego (English: Ludwik Waryński Silesian Medical Academy) in March 1950. During the first five years of its existence, the Academy, having one medical faculty and a dental department, launched a full range of clinical and theoretical units necessary for the implementation of the teaching process. 

From the beginning, however, it struggled with the dispersion of the clinical base. Theoretical departments, the rector's office and the library were located in the post-hospital complex of Spółka Bracka in Rokitnica, while clinical departments were located in hospitals in Zabrze and Bytom. The creation of the foundations of the Medical University of Silesia was accompanied by the project of building a campus in Zabrze, but it was not implemented due to the lack of investment funds. It also proved impossible to merge the Academy in Bytom. 

Thus, out of necessity, the "temporary" distribution of the clinical base extended to other cities of the Silesian region - Lubliniec, Tarnowskie Góry and Katowice. In Zabrze and Biskupice, where the Academy took over all hospitals, three clinical hospitals were organized, covering all inpatient treatment and specialist clinics. 

Due to the lack of prospects for the development of the University in Zabrze, in the second half of the 1950s, efforts were made to move it to Katowice and to build an academic campus in Katowice-Ligota. These plans - opening a new chapter in the history of the Academy - took real shape in the next decade, when the rector's office was moved to the capital of the voivodeship, the fourth clinical hospital was opened on the basis of the largest hospital in Katowice at that time. Mielęcki, and in Katowice-Ligota a cornerstone was laid for the construction of the Central Clinical Hospital, medical theory units, student houses and a hotel for nurses. In 1971, the final decision of the Council of Ministers was made to establish Katowice as the seat of the Silesian Medical Academy. 

University Mission Statement 

The mission of the Medical University of Silesia in Katowice is to discover and pass the truth through undertaken researches, up-to-date education of students in medical professions in connection with raising in the spirit of respecting the freedom of knowledge, humanism and ethics as well as cooperation with the social and economic environment. Accreditation In 1996 the university was accredited by United States Department of Education and an English language division was established. 

The university has since obtained accreditation from all 50 states' medical boards, most recently California. The inaugural class consisted of a handful of students from the United States and the division now includes 517 students from countries in seven continents, most commonly the United States, Sweden, Norway, the United Kingdom, Israel, and Saudi Arabia and South Africa . A chapter of the American Medical Students Association (AMSA) was established by the division's students in 2002. The division's Israeli students have the option of completing their final two years of study in Barzilai Medical Center in Ashkelon, Israel.