Pins & Needles
THE BLOG OF THE GEOFFREY KAYE MUSEUM OF ANAESTHETIC HISTORY
Covid-19 and the museum
There’s a lot going on right now. You’re probably getting a lot of emails cancelling events you’ve been looking forward to for ages or outlining organisations’ responses to the Covid-19 pandemic. This is another one. The museum is part of the Australian and New...
Australian Women Doctors and the Scottish Women’s Hospitals
On Saturday, 21 September, 2019, the museum curator gave a presentation in Hobart to a meeting of COMA (Collection of Medical Artefacts). The presentation looked at the way women doctors from Australia became involved with the Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign...
Portrait of Professor Kate Leslie – 2013
Professor Kate Leslie was ANZCA President from 2010 - 2012. At the end of each president’s term, the college commissions a portrait. There is now quite the collection of painted portraits dating back to 1992, when the college formally came into being. In this post,...
Sandakan Prisoner of War Camp WWII – Northwest Borneo
Dr Colin Chilvers is a Tasmanian anaesthetist, and was co-convenor for the 2019 ANZCA Annual Scientific Meeting, held in Kuala Lumpur. After the meeting, he took a well earned break and travelled to Sandakan in Northwest Borneo, where he visited the site of the former...
Congratulations to Dr Christine Ball, AM
Dr Christine Ball was one of the people honoured in the 2019 Queen's Birthday Honours. We've always known she was pretty special, and feel honoured that she gives so much of herself to the Geoffrey Kaye Museum of Anaesthetic History. It's also marvellous that she has...
Anaesthesia and Pain Medicine on the Thai-Burma Railway
When Singapore fell in February 1942, the Imperial Japanese Army suddenly found itself in control of some 60,000 Allied prisoners of war (POW), most of whom were British, Australian or Dutch. Approximately 22,000 POWs were Australian soldiers and among them were 106...
Women & Medicine Symposium – International Women’s Day
This is the museum’s first post for 2019, and it’s a really exciting one. We’re going to kick off this year with a full-day history symposium about women and medicine on International Women’s Day (8 March). It’s a pretty broad theme and, because of that, we’ve got a...
Portrait of Professor David A Scott, 2018
At the end of each president's term, the Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists (ANZCA) commissions a portrait. There is now quite the collection of painted portraits dating back to 1992, when the college formally came into being. In 2016, ANZCA Council...
The History of Women in Medicine at the 2018 Sydney ASM
For the last few years the museum has been attending the ANZCA Annual Scientific Meeting. It seems a natural place to fully launch our exhibitions, meet fellows and trainees, and promote the incredible history and heritage of the specialties of anaesthesia and pain...
Reading the Gwen Wilson Archive
In 2017 representatives from the Geoffrey Kaye Museum, Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences, and Harry Daly Museum joined forces to present a session at the Australian and New Zealand Society of the History of Medicine (ANZSHM) conference held at the Australian...
The Rare Privilege of Medicine – a new exhibition
On International Women’s Day we launched our new exhibition, The Rare Privilege of Medicine: Women anaesthetists in Australia and New Zealand. It’s a small offering, highlighting 10 women from the late 19th Century through to the mid 20th Century, but it also features...
The benefits of hands-on history
Jack Rayner is a 2nd year student of history at Swinburne University. Jack is a recent addition to the volunteer team at the Geoffrey Kaye Museum and has been attempting to take classroom skills into the real-world. His research will be contributing to a 2018...
The Value of ANZCA Corporate Collection
Susanne Ciavatta is currently undertaking her Masters in Museum Studies at Deakin University. Susie has been volunteering with the Geoffrey Kaye Museum since November 2016, and has been working on identifying, cataloguing and meeting the storage needs of the ANZCA...
The Mütter Museum, Philadelphia
When museum people travel they do pretty much what everybody else does, they visit museums. The Mütter Museum wasn’t my first museum in America, but I’ve had it on my list of “must see” museums for a long time and it really is a fascinating place. Recently, it’s even...
The Boston Museum of Fine Art
There is a growing movement that brings together the forces of art and science. Often, it’s presented as an artist’s interpretation of a scientific moment, such as Persistence of Vision: Antarctica, a project to recreate modern versions of some of the most iconic...
International Symposium on the History of Anesthesia (Part 2)
A conference’s opening reception is often an indication of how well the whole event will come together. At the 9th International Symposium on the History of Anaesthesia (ISHA), the opening reception was held at the famous Ether Dome at Massachusetts General Hospital....
The International Symposium on the History of Anaesthesia
The International Symposium on the History of Anesthesia Every four years, people interested in the history of anaesthesia gather from around the world to present their research to a group of like-minded individuals. 2017 is the 9th International Symposium on the...
Working in Muttaburra
Dr John Williamson is a retired anaesthetist, who began his medical career as a GP. He currently lives in Melbourne and is an invaluable tour guide at the Geoffrey Kaye Museum of Anaesthetic History, as well as the Shrine of Remembrance. In this post, he recounts some...