Get hands on with medical history at our brand-new lunchtime handling session.

Register for free with Art Tickets - drop in anytime between 12pm and 2pm.

Join a member of the archives, heritage library and museum team to explore a selection of objects from our collection. You will handle the everyday and the essential tools of physicians over time from early stethoscopes to ceramic spittoons. Learn the stories behind how these objects shaped advances in medical history over time as you experience for yourself the equipment used by doctors in the past.  

Plus have a go at diagnosing historic diseases! Can you diagnose a patient’s ailment from a historic description? Find out what physicians in the past thought and how they would have treated these ailments.

You can also explore the rest of the museum including:

• Temporary exhibition, ‘Unfamiliar’, taking a new look at the collections
• The Prujean chest of 17th century surgical implements
• Collections of silver, sculpture and fine art throughout the building
• The Hoffbrand collection of apothecary jars and the Symons collection of medical instruments
• The anatomical tables – 17th century human remains made into teaching tools

Find out how to get here

Art Tickets is an online ticket booking service operated by the Art Fund for the benefit of UK museums and galleries.