History

About Us

In 1892, in an old Baptist church on Bond Street, was Notre Dame des Anges, a boarding house for working women operated by the Sisters of St. Joseph. As with many other cities of its time, a diphtheria epidemic was sweeping Toronto and the hard-pressed medical officer of health issued an appeal to the Sisters. The Sisters answered the call to service and founded St. Michael's Hospital.

The Hospital began with a bed capacity of 26 and a staff of six doctors and four graduate nurses. Within a year, accommodation was increased to include two large wards and an emergency department. By 1912, bed capacity reached 300, and a five-room operating suite was added.

As early as 1894, St. Michael's Hospital received medical students and in 1920 negotiated a formal agreement with the faculty of medicine at the University of Toronto that continues to this day.

Between 1892 and 1974, St. Michael's school of nursing graduated 81 classes, totalling 5,177 graduates. The school was closed in 1974 when nursing education was moved into the community college system. Thereafter, the Hospital opened a school for medical record librarians, one of the first, and also participated in the preparation of dietitians and X-ray and laboratory technologists.

As Toronto grew and expanded, so did the Hospital. Ongoing physical expansion, most prominent in the 1960s, increased the original 26 bed facility to a high of 900 beds.

In the late 1960s, as ambulatory (outpatient) care became more advanced, the number of inpatient beds was reduced.

Since the establishment of St. Michael's Hospital as a corner stone of the downtown Toronto medical community over a hundred years ago, there have been many significant milestones. In the years to come, many more are anticipated.