Academy of Medical Sciences

The following is an interim description which may change when detailed cataloguing takes place.

Papers relating to the establishment and early development of the Academy, including Council minutes, Annual General Meeting papers, publications (reports, responses to consultations and Fellows' newsletters) and other administrative records. Included are papers generated prior to the establishment of the Academy by the secretariats of the Royal Society of Medicine and the Royal Society, 1995-1998, and papers of the Academy's founder President, Professor Sir Peter Lachmann, which were transferred to the Academy from his office in Cambridge.

The Academy was founded in 1998 to bring together biomedical scientists and clinical academics within a single national organisation "with the express purpose of promoting the translation of advances in medical science into benefits for patients and the population at large". Further information about the origins of the Academy may be found in First steps: a personal account of the formation of the Academy of Medical Sciences, a history written by the Academy’s founder President, Sir Peter Lachamnn.

The Academy positions itself as one of five learned academies in the UK alongside the Royal Society, Royal Academy of Engineering, British Academy and Royal Society of Edinburgh. Election to Fellowship is available to individuals who have made an "exceptional contribution", either in the form of an original discovery or a sustained contribution to scholarship. Fellows are drawn from clinical academic medicine, veterinary science, dentistry, laboratory science, medical and nursing care and other professions allied to medical science.

Working paties led by Fellows carry out studies and publish reports and recommendations on a wide range of topics. These have included, for example, the science of ageing, pandemic influenza and inter-species embryos. The Academy also organises symposia, workshops and conferences, as well as scientific lectures. It responds to consultations and topical events with position papers and expert statements. It also supports the career development of scientists.

In 2008, when the Novartis Foundation, previously known as the Ciba Foundation, was wound up, certain of its functions were merged with those of the Academy. The Foundation had been founded in 1949 by the Swiss pharmaceutical company of the same name. It was a charity with the main aim of promoting collaboration in the medical sciences by the organisation of symposia, thus allowing experts from different fields to share ideas. The Foundation's headquarters had been in Portland Place, London and in 2010 the Academy opened new headquarters on the site.