As the 11th oldest medical school in the United States and the third oldest in the Southeast, the Georgia Health Sciences University has played a significant role in American medical education for for over 180 years.

Graduates from GHSU's five colleges — Allied Health Sciences, Dental Medicine, Graduate Studies, Medicine and Nursing — deliver health care throughout the state, the nation and the world. GHSU’s threefold mission of teaching, research and patient care is incorporated into GHSU’s hospital and clinics, an academic medical center, and a leading critical care referral center for Georgia and the Southeast. 

As the first hospital in Georgia to be designated a Level I Trauma Center for the 13-county East Central Georgia Health District, GHSU provides state-of-the-art care for the latest advances in medical knowledge and technology.

The Surgical Research service, established in the early 1970s, supports the educational goals of the university in all aspects of clinical and basic science research. Surgical research is part of the GHSU Department of Surgery, chaired by Dr. Charles G. Howell. The service also provides clinical support for multiple surgical subspecialties, as well as several other departments on the GHSU campus. We support the research activities of more than 60 faculty members, as well as numerous residents and medical students actively involved in GHSU's approximately 600 research grants.