John Hopkins is considered one of the greatest healthcare organizations in the United States of America. The technology John Hopkins possesses is among the most state of the art and cutting edge the healthcare industry has ever seen. However, I believe one particular social event in their history helped shape them to become who they are today. At the beginning of the 20th century John Hopkins toyed with the idea of allowing women to attend medical school. Being the first medical schools to allow this, it was a highly debated subject and many did not agree. They were mostly afraid women could not handle some of the material discussed in class or that it may lead to women not being able to get married. However, in order for them to establish the medical college they needed additional funding. Five women from Baltimore created the Women’s Fund Committee, which raised enough money to open the medical college. Their only condition was that the school accepts women. The board agreed and when the college opened its doors in 1893 three out of the first eighteen students were women.
Throughout the decades women have made a huge impact at John Hopkins. Many of the women who graduated from the medical college went on to discover some great things in medicine. For example, Helen Taussig, who graduated from Hopkins in 1927, came up with the “blue baby” idea which opened up the door to modern day heart surgery. She also made some of the basic contributions to understanding how the heart works in general. Another example was Caroline Bedell Thomas. She developed the first preventatives for heart disease. She later became the first women to be elected to the Association of American Physicans. At the beginning of the 21st century, roughly 100 years after making the decision to accept women, about 53 percent of enrolling students are women outnumbering men for the first time in the