AFTER years of being stuck in the stockroom collecting dust, the UST medical artifacts will now be displayed in a home of its own.
According to Faculty of Medicine and Surgery Regent Fr. Jerry Manlangit, O.P., the Faculty plans to construct a new museum in the second floor of the St. Martin de Porres Bldg. this year “to save the medical legacy of the University from deterioration and neglect.”
“Medicine in the Philippines has always been attached to UST,” he said. “One cannot have a history of medicine in the Philippines without relating it to the history of medicine in the University.”
Fr. Manlangit added that the museum would benefit Thomasians as a learning resource of UST’s rich history in medicine.
Incidentally, the Faculty is the premier medical school in the Philippines with a history dating as far back as 1871.
He said earlier plans to restore the museum never materialized due to financial constraints, until the UST Medical Alumni Association in Southern California agreed to fund the P2.3-million project last June.
Among the “hidden” prized artifacts of the University are old medical books, journals, instruments, and apparatuses used by doctors—including those used by its alumnus, the national hero Jose Rizal.
The Regent explained the old “museum” of forensic medicine was just a number of ordinary cabinet-sized display cases along the hallways of the Medicine building. Since the old museum’s formation in the 1970s, it eventually “fell apart” due to neglect—and the pieces were kept to prevent further deterioration. The artifacts were displayed for an exhibit in 2002, but only for a certain period of time.
