Human Physiology Eamonn M M Quigley MD FRCP FACP FACG Head of the Medical School National University of Ireland, Cork Department of Physiology, Sir Bertram Windle Building, Medical Building, University College, Cork. The Department of Physiology, a primary member of the faculties of Medicine and Science, has been an independent department since 1907. The current staff complement includes three professors, two senior lecturers and five full-time lecturers. The Department is an active participant in the Biosciences Research Institute which has attracted major infra-structural funding. Up to 25 science students take the four year honours degree course in Physiology and modules are offered in second year to 180 students of biological sciences, nutritional science, chemistry of pharmaceutical compounds, and neuroscience.
Teaching is organised on the basis of modules.
A joint professorship of Medicine and Human Physiology has been established in the last academic year to underpin vertical links in the medical programme between the physiology and clinical medicine. Indeed in the second year of the medical and dental programmes vertical integration is initiated through presentation of simple clinical cases to facilitate the integration of medical science with clinical practice. Attendance at undergraduate laboratory classes is an important part of the teaching programme where students are introduced to a variety of skills and physiological measurements. Emphasis on these areas is continued in the examination process through problem solving short-answer questions. The BSc students follow courses in systematic physiology and in the third and fourth year of this programme emphasis is placed on cell and epithelial physiology and on aspects of integrative physiology.