Writing in his diary on 25 March 1935, James Lloyd Turner Graham, a student at the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin, mused on the question of women in the medical profession:

Graham's remarks on women in the medical profession were nothing new. Since the question of women's admission to the medical profession had emerged in the late nineteenth century, women's suitability for medical study had been hotly debated by members of the medical profession and the general public. Arguments against women studying medicine were rooted in Victorian beliefs about women's physical, mental and emotional natures which found their origins in physiological theories from the late nineteenth century. At the same time, those arguing in favour of women studying medicine suggested that women's emotional temperaments made them eminently suitable for a career in the field, particularly in the areas of women's and children's health, and that there were also opportunities for women doctors in the missionary field and in India.3 Irish women's rise in the professions was slow. In the 1900s, teaching was the main option for female university graduates, and it was not until the First World War that a discernible change in attitude occurred with regard to women doctors in Britain and Ireland.

This chapter aims to explore the history of women in Irish medical schools from the 1880s up until the 1940s. I will provide some background regarding the history of women's entry to Irish medical schools, suggesting that Irish institutions, albeit in some cases for financial reasons, were largely supportive of women's admission to medical schools as well as hospitals for clinical experience.