Birth and development of respiratory medicine at Université de Montréal: From phthisiology to respiratory medicine

Abstract

The authors relate the history of respiratory medicine in the network of hospitals treating adult patients and affiliated to the Université de Montréal in the 20th century. The Institut Bruchési, the Hôpital du Sacré-Cœur and the professors of the Faculty of Medicine of Université de Montréal played a founding role in the organization of health care and teaching of phthisiology. They were active actors in the slow transition from phthisiology to pneumology from 1940 onward. The successive founding of the Hôpital sanatorium Rosemont and of Institut Lavoisier in 1950 represent the key landing steps of research on other respiratory diseases besides tuberculosis. From 1960 to 1970, phthisiology evolved to pneumology: through the development of respiratory physiology; the public health concerns regarding the impact of smoking, causing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and lung cancer; the changing status of sanatoria that became general hospitals; the increased frequency of asthma, sleep apnea and occupational lung disease; and the therapeutic breakthroughs offered by oxygen therapy, rehabilitation and lung transplant. The practice of pneumology is greatly influenced by medical imaging as well as the interventionist and multidisciplinary approach in a network of hospitals with a resolutely academic intention.