ABSTRACT
The first meeting of the Emergency Postgraduate Courses (EPGC) Committee was held at the RSM on 24 December 1918 (i.e. Christmas Eve) at 5.00 pm, with Sir Humphry Rolleston in the Chair (see Chapter 3). Apart from MacAlister, Lane, Colonel Charles Fagge, and HS Pendlebury, the two others present were HJ Paterson and L Bromley. MacAlister stressed the need for short postgraduate courses for American and Dominion medical officers 'who were rapidly being demobilised and were being given three months' leave of absence for the express purpose of taking such cours [sic] before their return hom e...'. Some, he told the meeting, were 'already returning to Paris, where post-graduate courses had already been organised'. It was resolved th a t'... immediate steps be taken to communicate with the Deans of the Medical Schools... to arrange for a joint course, so that officers by paying one fee [possibly 'ten guineas for a complete course of three months, with proportionately lower fees for 1 and 2 month courses'] might be able to take subjects at different hospitals'. The Chairman asked whether this initiative would clash with Sir William Osier's (who, incidentally, countersigned the minute of this meeting) proposed scheme for perma nent postgraduate medical education in London.1
