Andrew George Malcolm was an Irish physician and medical historian, who was employed by the General Hospital in Belfast.
Background
Malcolm was born in Belfast in 1818 to Andrew George Malcolm, the minister first of Dunmurry and then of Newry, and Eleanor Hunter of Dunmurry. His father died when he was only five years of age. At the end of his schooling at Institute he had been assistant to Henry Montgomery, the famous headmaster of the English department and his father"s successor at Dunmurry.
Education
Malcolm graduated from Edinburgh in 1842 at the age of 24.
Career
He has been called the "earliest respiratory physiologist" of the hospital. Today, he is mostly known for his reports on the sanitary state of Belfast and particularly for his History of the General Hospital. Malcolm is also considered to be the "first historian" of Belfast General Hospital.
lieutenant was there, at the medical school, that he would commence his medical training.
In1843, Malcolm was appointed medical attendant to the Dispensary in Belfast, to attend the sick at the Dispensary rooms and in their own homes. In 1846 he was appointed to the hospital as physician, at the age of 28.
From then on he was in regular attendance on the sick in the old hospital in Frederick Street. He lived nearby in York Street as those working in the medical profession did in those times.
Apart from his general medicine, Malcolm had a class in skin diseases and was powerful and assiduous teacher.
He says in his History, "Clinical instruction is not to be imparted by a careless walk through the wards. On the part of the teacher, the most patient, assiduous, vigilant, zealous and unceasing labour, and on the part of the pupil, the most rigid attendance, are absolutely necessary to develop the educational resources of a Hospital".