Prof Malcolm Nicolson
- Professor of the History of Medicine (Economic and Social History)
- Professor (Institute of Health and Wellbeing)
- Adviser of Studies (Social Sciences College Academic and Student Administration)
telephone: 01413306070
email: Malcolm.Nicolson@glasgow.ac.uk
Research Interests
- History of medical technology
- History of physical diagnosis
- History of obtetrics
- History of Scottish medicine, especially in the 19th and 20th Centuries
Research Contributions
- Member, Editorial Board, Journal of Clinical Research and Bioethics, 2010-
- Member, Editorial Board, Notes and Records of the Royal Society, 2010-
- Section Editor, History of Reproductive Science and Medicine, Reproductive Biomedicine, 2010.
- Member, Editorial Board, Spontaneous Generations: A Journal for the History and Philosophy of Science, 2009-
- Editor, Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine Occasional Publications Series, 1992-2002
Exhibitions Organised
- Member, Academic committee,'Anatomy Acts', Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, 2006
- Member, Academic committee, 'A Healing Passion: Medicine in Glasgow Past and Present', Hunterian Museum, University of Glasgow, 2006
- 'Achievements and Advances: the British Medical Ultrasound Society Historical Collection', Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, London (with J. Fleming) 2001
- 'Ian Donald and the Diasonograph', British Medical Ultrasound Society Annual Conference, Edinburgh, (with J. Fleming) 2001
Conferences Organised
- Member, Committee, James Young Simpson Bicentenary Conference, Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, 2011
- Witness Seminar, 'The developmen of dental education in Scotland', (with David McGowan), Centre for the History of Medicine.
- Witness Seminar, ‘The development of child and adolescent psychiatry, 1960-1990’, (with Philip Graham) Centre for the History of Medicine, Glasgow, 2009.
- ‘History of Scottish Psychiatry’, Wellcome Trust Regional Forum for the History of Medicine in Scotland, Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, 2009.
- Wellcome Trust Regional Forum for the History of Medicine in Scotland, 1996-2006.
- Annual Conference, Society for the Social History of Medicine, Glasgow, (with J. Mills and J. Stewart) 2008
- Witness Seminar, 'The development of old age Psychiatry from the 1960s until 1989', Glasgow, (with T. Arie and C. Hilton) 2008
- Witness Seminar, 'The history of domiciliary care in geriatric medicine' (with K. Beard) 2007
- Rank Prize Fund Conference 'The origins of the science and practice of infant and child nutrition and feeding', (with L.T. Weaver) 2007
Recent Grants
- Wellcome Trust, 2009, ‘A New History of Yorkhill’ (with L. Weaver)
- Wellcome Trust, 2009, ‘Scottish Inebriate Reformatories, 1901-1925: the response to the last alcohol epidemic’ (with I. Smith).
- Wellcome Trust, 2008, Masters studentships
- Guthrie Trust, 2008, iin support of a Witness Seminar on the history of old-age psychiatry
- Wellcome Trust, 2007, Masters studentships
- 'Conductive Education in Hungary' (with E. Becsei-Kilborn), British Academy, 2006,
- Wellcome Trust, 2006, Masters Quota and Competiton studentships
- 'R.D. Laing' (with A. Beveridge), Wellcome Trust, 2005
- 'Infant health in 20th Century Scotland' (with A. Crowther, M. Dupree and L. Weaver), Wellcome Trust, 2004
- 'Moving boundaries: Surgery in Flanders and the Scottish Lowlands in the eighteenth century, a comparative study' (with T. van Bortel), Wellcome Trust, 2002
- 'From Food for Babies to Feeding Babies' (with L Weaver), Wellcome Trust, 2002
- British Medical Ultrasound Society, 2001, Travel and conference expenses
Supervision Areas
History of medicine, with particular emphasis on the history of obstetrics, Scottish medicine and twentieth-century biomedical science.
Current Research Supervision
M.D. - Alexander Pollock, ‘A study of peptic ulcer in the second half of the twentieth century’, 2008-
M.D. - Kenneth MacAulay, ‘A volitional regulation of the marriage state: The dissemination of birth control knowledge in Scotland, 1940-1975’, 2008-
Ph.D. - Hazel Morrison, ‘Exploring the instability of language, culture and identity’, 2010-, AHRC Studentship
Ph.D. – Martha Kirby, ‘Narratives of eating disorders’, 2010-, ESRC Studentship.
Ph.D – Roz Sullivan, ‘Professional misconduct: The work of the disciplinary committee of the General Medical Council’. 2010-
M.D. – Iain Smith, ‘The medical response to the "Alcohol Question" in Scotland, 1750-2000’, 2010-
Recently completed supervised students
Ph.D. - Maureen Park, ‘The role and educational implications of fine art in Scottish hospitals’, 2001-2007.
Ph.D. - Tina Van Bortel, ‘Moving boundaries: Civic surgeons and medical practice in the Austrian Low Countries, c 1700-1794’, 2003-2007, Wellcome Trust Studentship.
Ph.D. - Mark Skippen, ‘Innovation and diffusion in diagnostic techniques of cephalopelvic disproportion in nineteenth-century Scotland’, 2004-2009, University Studentship.
Ph.D. - Rachel McAdams, ‘The theory and practice of neonatal resuscitation since World War II’, 2005-2009, Wellcome Trust Studentship.
Undergraduate
Level 1
- Life Histories, MBChB
Level 2
- Student Selected Component, 'Topics in the History of Medicine', MBChB
Honours
- Innovations in Western Medicine, 1790-1960, Social Origins and Cultural Impacts
- Nature's Economy: Environment and Ecology in the Western Tradition
Postgraduate
- MSc course: Studies in the History of Medicine I, From 1700 to 1850
- MSc course: Studies in the History of Medicine II, From 1850 to 2000
- Convenor, Graduate School Core Course: Introduction to Social Theory for Researchers
Recent and Forthcoming Conference and Seminar Papers
- ‘The hyperbaric oxygen conflict and the divided role of the post-war paediatrician’, (with R McAdams and L.T. Weaver). Spring Meeting of Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, York 2007
- ‘Another look at the “Glasgow School”: Scientific knowledge and clinical authority in the aetiology of rickets and dental caries’, Wellcome Trust Regional Forum, Glasgow, 2007
- ‘Vitamins, rickets and child health - Scientific knowledge and clinical authority’, Rank Prize Fund Conference, Windermere, 2007
- ‘Scientific knowledge and clinical authority in dentistry: James Sim Wallace, diet, dental caries and rickets’, Annual Meeting, British Society for the History of Paediatrics, Dublin, 2007
- ‘Scientific knowledge and clinical authority - Infant feeding, dental caries and rickets’, Trans-national and cross-cultural perspectives in the history of medicine, Mumbai, India, 2007
- ‘I now realise the full enormity of what you are proposing, Brown’, (with J. Fleming) Commemorative Meeting, Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, London, 2008
- ‘“Behind the iron curtain” - Ultrasound and the Fetus‘, International Congress of Midwifery, Glasgow, 2008
- ‘The laboratory and the clinic: a conflictive or companionate relationship?’ Annual Conference, Society for the Social History of Medicine, Glasgow 2008
- ‘“Behind the iron curtain” - The innovation of fetal cephalometry’, Fetal Fortunes 2 Conference, Glasgow, 2009
- 'The Laboratory versus the Clinic? The Strange Case of Ralph Stockman', Annual Conference, Society for the Social History of Medicine, Durham University 2010.
- 'James Young Simpson and the Development of Physical Diagnosis', Pybus Society, Newcastle, 2011.
- 'James Young Simpson and the Development of Physical Diagnosis', Simpson Bicentenary Conference, Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, 2011.
- Poster, 'Medical Students' Attitudes towards the chronic sick’, (with Dr K. Mullen and Dr P. Cotton) 60th Anniversary Symposium, Section of Psychological Medicine, University of Glasgow, June 2009