History

The practice of urology at The Mount Sinai Hospital can be traced back two centuries to the Skin and Venereal Disease Clinic, established in 1890. In 1895, a Genitourinary Service within the Department of Surgery was created under William Fluhrer, a noted surgeon who devised various instruments, including a urethrotome. Fluhrer was succeeded as chief of service by Hermann Goldenberg in 1902. Goldenberg was a dermatologist who studied venereal disease. In 1910 he also became the chief of Mount Sinai's Dermatology service. The next year, Edwin Beer became chief of the Genitourinary service, making Beer head of one of the four surgical services. Beer was a young surgeon who had made a tremendous contribution in 1910 with his work on the "Removal of Neoplasms of the Urinary Bladder by Fulguration", published in JAMA. This work was important as a new treatment method for bladder tumors, and also made possible the development of other electroresection methods.

Beer also developed a pediatric cystoscope in 1911, continuing a Mount Sinai tradition. In 1905, F. Tilden Brown, an early intern at Mount Sinai, developed the Brown Cystoscope. This was later modified by Leo Buerger, a Mount Sinai surgeon, creating the Brown-Buerger Cystoscope. Maximilian Stern, who was on the Urology clinic staff, developed the prototype of the Stern-McCarthy resectoscope.

Another urologist, Moses Swick, made a landmark contribution in 1929 when he published an article that introduced Uroselectan as the first radio-opaque media for visualization of the urinary tract. This was published in Germany, where Swick had been sent by Mount Sinai for additional study following his internship. In 1930, Beer and Abraham Hyman published a monograph on Disease of the Urinary Tract in Children, the first textbook on pediatric urology in this country. Beer stepped down as chief of service in 1937 and was followed by Dr. Hyman. In 1942 Urology became a full department, separate from the Department of Surgery.

Gordon D. Oppenheimer became chief of the Urology Department in 1947. He was one of the authors, with Eli Ginzburg and Burrill Crohn, of the paper that described regional ileitis, later known as Crohn's Disease. Oppenheimer established the residency program in Urology and greatly expanded the number and scope of clinical research projects. The Department's involvement in research included testing new antibiotics and participating in the testing of the first artificial kidney, created in Europe by Dr. Kolpf. The Department of Urology subsequently developed an better artificial kidney and spent many years testing and improving their model. While work continued on the artificial kidney, there also began an interest in kidney transplantation in the early 1950s.

Dr. Oppenheimer retired in 1963 and was followed by Herbert Brendler, the first full-time chairman of the Department and a leader in the field of prostatic cancer. Shortly after Brendler's arrival at Mount Sinai, Dr. Elliot Leiter also joined the staff. Dr. Brendler re-organized the Department, and incorporated the Urology Service at the newly affiliated City Hospital Center at Elmhurst into the resident training program. He created a division of pediatric urology. The ward service was expanded and so the residency program grew from three to nine residents in early 1964.

The research interests of the Department over the 1970s were urinary infections, prostatic cancer and high blood pressure. The Department was very active in Mount Sinai's developing kidney transplant program in the mid-1960s, with the first successful transplant in 1967. It grew to be one of the largest transplant programs during these years.

In 1968, the first students were admitted to the Mount Sinai School of Medicine. Dr. Brendler received the additional title of Chairman of the Department of Urology in the medical school, and faculty positions were created for the staff.

In 1982, Dr. Brendler stepped down as Chairman/Director of the Department of Urology, but continued his activities in professional organizations, serving as President of the American Urological Association from 1983/84 and as Editor of the Journal of Urology from 1982-84.

In 1984, it was announced that Michael J. Droller, M.D. would be the next Chairman/Director. Dr. Droller's interests were specifically in urologic oncology, but he took steps to expand the department's clinical programs to cover the urologic subspecialty fields, such as neurourology, stone disease, and endocrinolgic urology. In 1991, Dr. Droller edited a surgical text, The Surgical Management of Urologic Disease: An Anatomic Approach, which has become an accepted standard in the field.

Today the Department supervises residents at the James J. Peters VA Medical Center, the City Hospital Center at Elmhurst, the Queens General Hospital, and beyond. In 1985, the Department was fortunate to receive an endowment from Mr. and Mrs. Milton Petrie. In recognition of their generosity, the department is now formally called the Milton and Carroll Petrie Department of Urology.