Lecturers from Macedonia Elected for the First Time to the Faculty of Medicine in Skopje in the Period 1961-63

Aim: To present a group of young doctors from R. Macedonia who were elected as lecturers at the Faculty of Medicine (FM) in Skopje, R. Macedonia, in the period 1961-63.

Method: A retrospective study based on archive materials, encyclopaedias and jubilee publications of the FM and Faculty of Dentistry in Skopje, other relevant sources of information, and a review of the relevant literature.

Results: The Skopje FM was founded in 1947 and the first meeting of the Teachers’ Council of the Faculty was held on March 17, 1947. The first generation of 153 students was enrolled in the autumn of 1947 and the first lecture was delivered on November 3, 1947.

Besides 15 doctors from R. Macedonia - faculty staff, who had been appointed in the period from 1947-54, and a group of 24 lecturers from R. Macedonia who had been elected assistant professors in the period from 1955-60, an additional group of 17 Macedonian lecturers had been elected for the first time in the period from 1961-63. Those 56 pioneers and coryphaei of medicine in R. Macedonia played important roles in the establishing and/or initial and further development of a number of the faculty departments/chairs, institutes and clinics within the newly established FM in Skopje in 1947 and in the first 15-20 years of its initial development, until 1960s and later.

Conclusion: The Skopje FM, founded in 1947, played a crucial role in the education of medical professionals, in improving the poor health status of the population and the overall further development of the health system and provision of health care to the population of R. Macedonia. The contribution of the third group of 17 lecturers from R. Macedonia in furthering the development of the Skopje FM, during the 1960s and later, was very important.