Items (a) through (d) belonged to Dr. Albert Cuddy, a family physician who graduated from medical school in 1930. Together, they indicate the wide variety of procedures that family physicians in the Toronto area would have performed as part of their daily practices.
By the beginning of the 20th century, practicing family physicians in Toronto would have spent four years studying at a medical school, followed by an internship period in both the office of a qualified physician and in a hospital.
While this educational model remains largely the same today, the above items attest to the broad changes in the nature of general practice that have taken place throughout the 20th century, and indeed since the time that Dr. Cuddy was practicing.
(a) Box of Surgical Tools. The small size of these tools suggests that they were probably used for facial surgery.
(b) Syringe, used to aspirate fluid from the pleural cavity
(c) “Universal Ear Piercer”
(d) Masks for administering general anaesthetic
Source: Medical Alumni Association Collection