PAOLO MANTEGAZZA E LA FACOLTÀ DI MEDICINA: UNA PRESIDENZA DI CAMBIAMENTO

The years during which Paolo Mantegazza served as Dean of the Medical Faculty, the Country was involved in a considerably large social turmoil, under the pressure of the so called student revolution, which was spreading through Europe. Such a movement, albeit very often out of control (with dangerous deviations), still was, in its basic and best aspects, the expression of an urgent need for innovation and social change. Mantegazza, who was a very qualified scientist in Pharmacology, perceived by intuition the need for a controlled change in the style and action of his office, and used a “gentle leadership” to carry on consistent innovations in the traditional “academic” policy of the Faculty. His major achievement was twofold: first, he was able to expand the Faculty into city hospitals other than the traditional Main Central University Hospital, thus allowing students to perform clinical practice in a new environment, more patient oriented than the classical one; second, this expansion offered teachers and researchers the opportunity to practice a less formal teaching, paying more attention, both from a clinical, scientific and teaching point of view, to the complexity of the patient and his/her social and personal context, with relevant consequences on the educational approach and to teacher-students relationships.