History of Lexington Medical Society

Revolutionary War Era Medicine in America

• From the Colonial period in America, most physicians were trained by the apprenticeship method, serving for a given period of time , customarily five to seven years, and often living with the physician’s family.
• The MD degree was so unusual that of the 3,500 practicing physicians in the colonies during the period of the Revolutionary War, less than 300 had received a medical degree.
• Of the 300 physicians with degrees, most had earned those degrees in Europe, because the Philadelphia Medical College (later University of Pennsylvania) and King’s College (later Columbia University) were the only medical schools available to Americans in their homeland.

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 38

• Over 218 years ago, anyone who wished to practice medicine did so.
• There was no need for a degree or certificate.
• Among the medical practitioners in Lexington during the 1790s qualified physicians with the desire to show to the public those traits and credentials that differentiated the regular physician (allopaths) from medical pretenders (irregulars).
• The regulars physicians’ need for respect and recognition led to the founding of a medical society with membership limited to those deemed qualified.
• Membership then was essentially a statement of the applicant’s educational credentials.
• Education, not nobility nor place, set the society members apart from pretenders.

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 10

Lexington Medical Society Founded

• The founding of the Lexington Medical Society in 1799 preceded the establishment of the Medical Department of Transylvania University, also in 1799.
• The two institutions grew side by side for almost thirty-five years.
• There were 10-12 physicians in Lexington in 1799.
• The 1799 Lexington Medical Society constitution and bylaws are lost.
• The founder of the Lexington Medical society, Dr. Samuel Brown (brother of John Brown, Kentucky’s first United States Senator), was the first professor of medicine appointed by Transylvania University.
• Dr. Brown helped establish the first national medical society in American, Kappa Lambda of Hippocrates, which later influenced the structure of the American Medical Association.

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 11

Dr. Samuel Brown Founder, Lexington Medical Society

• Studied under the private tutelage of Dr. Benjamin Rush of Philadelphia, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and the most renowned American Physician of the time.He studied, along with Ephraim McDowell, at the University of Edinburgh Medical School in 1793.
• Received his medical degree at University of Aberdeen.
• Dr. Brown was the first professor of medicine west of the Alleghenies at Transylvania College.

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 30

Lexington’s Golden Age

• The pioneers and their children turned Lexington into the Athens of the West. Manufacturing, commerce, art, law, and politics flourished.
• During the golden age, Lexington laid at the major overland routes of the trans- Appalachian frontier.
• With the introduction of the steamboat in 1812, Lexington entered a long and humiliating decline that eventually culminated in the loss of its medical supremacy to the river cities of Cincinnati, Louisville, and St. Louis.
• Cincinnati and Louisville, both of which were mere villages when Lexington became a budding city, rapidly surpassed Lexington in population.

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 23

• Henry Miller was elected President of the Lexington Medical Society.
• He later was elected as the thirteenth president of the American Medical Association

Dr. Daniel Drake, President of the Lexington Medical Society

Dr. Daniel Drake, the foremost American medical educator of the nineteenth century.

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 16

Colonel Ethelbert Dudley, M.D.

• Chose to serve in the Union Army as a field officer rather than a physician.
• Commanded the 21st Infantry from Lexington.
• Graduate of Harvard University and Transylvania Medical School
.
  Died in 1862 of typhoid.

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 229

Statue of Dr. Ephraim McDowell, father of Abdominal Surgery, unveiled in Statuary Hall, U.S. Capitol

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 47

World War II

Fayette County physicians in World War II

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 31

Fayette County Medical Society Auxiliary was established on July 13

Mrs. Halbert Leet was named the first President

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West,  Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 307

Matthew Cotton Darnell, M.D. (1913-1992) was elected President of the Fayette County Medical Society

He volunteered for active naval service in 1944

Served as medical officer of the destroyer U.S.S. Laffey

He saw action at the D-Day Normandy invasion, The Philippine and Iwo Jima invasions and the battle near Okinawa.

He was wounded during a Kamikaze attack at Okinawa on April 15, 1945

Earned the Bronze Star and Purple Heart

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 310-312

Lexington became home to a new medical school, the University of Kentucky College of Medicine.

Dr. Bush Hunter (1894-1983) was the first African American physician to become a member of the Fayette County Medical Society.

He received his M.D. from Howard University and began practicing in Lexington in 1926. He continued to practice for an additional 50 years.

He was named the outstanding general practitioner of the year, 1970, by the Kentucky State Medical Association

Mayo, W. Porter, Medicine in the Athens of the West, Princeton, McClanahan Publishing House, 1999, Print, page 249

Fayette County Medical Society Created the Central Kentucky Blood Bank

The Fayette County Medical Society created Central Kentucky Blood Center in 1968 to centralize blood-banking services in Fayette County. Prior to that, Lexington hospitals operated their own blood collections.

The next year, CKBC began serving four Lexington hospitals and operated out of the basement of the Perkins Pancake House on Limestone Avenue. CKBC provided for 15,000 transfusions in its first full year.

As CKBC continued to grow and serve hospitals outside of Lexington, it added donor centers in Somerset and eastern Kentucky. In 1978, the blood center left its original location and opened at 330 Waller Avenue, where it remained until 2007 when it relocated to its current headquarters in Beaumont Centre.

That same year, CKBC management, acknowledging the increasing service area, dropped “Central” and changed its name to Kentucky Blood Center to better illustrate the blood bank’s mission of helping to save lives throughout Kentucky.

KBC soon opened a second Lexington location in the Andover Shoppes and a Louisville donor center in Middletown in 2014. Another Louisville center, located in the Hillview area, will open in March 2018.

Lexington Medical Society doctors continue to play a vital role in KBC’s success. According to KBC’s by-laws, the LMS president and vice president elect sit on the KBC Board of Directors. The president of the KBC Board is also a physician.

The late Dr. David Stevens, who was on the FCMC board that created Central Kentucky Blood Center, was also the first donor to give blood at the Waller Avenue location and the first one to give at the current Beaumont Donor Center.

Carolyn Kurz begins her 43 year career as the Executive Vice President/CEO of the Lexington Medical Society. Under her guidance and leadership, the Lexington Medical Society greatly expanded its membership. She ushered LMS into creating a couple of business operations in support of the membership. The first was the establishment of a 24/7 medical call center in 1984. The second was a credentialing service in 1995. Both operations are successfully operating to this day. During her tenure 8 LMS members became President of the Kentucky Medical Association, 6 became Chair of the KMA Board of Trustees, 1 became President of the American Medical Association, and 1 became Chair of the AMA Board of Trustees and later President of the American Medical Association. In 2011 she was awarded the AMA Medical Executive Lifetime Achievement Award.

Read 2014 LMS President Thomas H. Waid, MD tribute to Carolyn Kurz

Lexington Smoking Ban

Dr. David Stevens, an orthopedic surgeon and member of the Lexington-Fayette County Council, was instrumental in leading the effort to get a city-wide smoking ban passed. Dr. Stevens was President of the Lexington Medical Society in 1968.

Lexington Medical Society member Ardis Dee Hoven, M.D., elected as the President of the American Medical Association

Lexington Medical Society member Steven J. Stack, M.D., elected as the President of the American Medical Association.