International Museum of Surgical Science

As a teacher I just took my class here, and my students were very engaged. It is a fairly small place, but there is plenty of information to see. I also really liked how my students get to do the mock amputation as it was being done back in the days. I highly recommend this museum!

Every part of this museum is intriguing. There is one part on the 3^rd floor with the smart phone pictures that I would like to get to know more.

This museum is fairly large and has a mix of older artifacts and newer exhibits filled with scientific detail. I found it pretty expensive, but if you’re interested in medicine or science at all, it would be worth it. The location is beautiful and the building is fun to explore!

This is truly one of the hidden, under appreciated gems of the city. It is a beautiful museum with a lot of knowledge to impart. Medicine-​enthusiasts and the generally curious are both welcome here.
The museum is housed in a beautiful building that are reminiscent of the golden age of Chicago architecture. It is also very conveniently located a little north of downtown Chicago and is easily accessible by both the red line train and the 151 sheridan bus. (Quick tip: If you’re traveling via CTA from the northern side of the city, it is quicker to take the 147 to downtown and taking a southbound 151 to reach the museum than to take 151 from somewhere like Grainville and travel south to the museum)
Inside it houses beautiful paintings that depict ways in which medical procedures were carried out back in the day. There’s also a room containing sculptures of the stalwarts of the biochem history, from Marie Curie to Hippocrates. There are multiple floors dedicated to medical science. The rooms are individually dedicated to various topics — from bones to nerves, from vaccinations to worldwide allied medical endeavors.
I spent about 2.5 hours and that was with me peering through each display and info chart. But even an hour would have been enough to give a curious mind enough time to make a quick visit to the museum. The tickets are reasonably priced and are often offered at a discount price through deal sites like Groupon, Goldstar, etc.
This museum is deserving of 5 stars and I would highly recommend people to visit this museum and learn about the history of medicine.

This place was awesome and a great place to hit up for anyone interested in the history of medicine. We came over after reading about the place on Unilocal and loved the experience! I’m actually kind of baffled with how anyone who has any interest in medicine could not love this place!
A cool 15 bones to enter is totally worth you time. You’re greeted at a little gift shop where plush organs and hilarious anatomy themed lapel pins are at your fingertips! We got one for my dentist sister that had gansta teeth saying «Flossin isn’t just for rappers»…Classic
But onto, the museum. Four total floors of surgical history bliss are at your beck and call. The old school apothecary model room was pretty sweet and gave a glimpse into all the garbage that people were sold for a long time.
The Hall of Immortal and Hall of Murals were two of the coolest rooms I’ve ever been in. Life size marble statues of medical greats was like being in a Lord of the Rings scene for this Urology resident! The hall of murals had some incredible art and was just plain awesome.
The stone exhibit was great and there were a dozen or so rooms with a broad range of historical exhibits that we found fascinating.
Not a great place to come with young kids and easy to get through in 60 – 90 minutes.
One of the cooler places we’ve seen and one medical peeps will love!

Go if you have minimal medical knowledge and want to see kidney stones or love the history of medicine, but imo NOT worth it if you work in the medical field! Gives a great introduction to the history of surgery, medical illustration, and even nursing but since this is a museum, do not expect up to date information. Many exhibits are sponsored by various organizations or supply companies from various countries.

tl;dr: Skip the IMSS — there are better museums in Chicago for you to spend your money on.
My boyfriend and I were excited to learn about the IMSS from the Chicago Wikitravel page, but we walked away disappointed by the poor execution of what could have been a great concept.
There were 3 key areas where this museum fell short:
1. Slapdash organization of exhibits
The museum’s map, to its credit, does a great job of showing you the theme of each room. However, the exhibits aren’t organized logically at all — it’s not chronological and just seems to bring together different artworks and artifacts that are sometimes only tangentially related to surgery.
For example: One room over from the polio eradication exhibit (again, how is that related to surgery? That’s more related to medicine, rather than surgical science) is a small exhibit on spectacles and their cases over history. And why does the ophthalmology exhibit only gloss over cataract surgery, which has seen tremendous strides around the world?
2. Strong presence of sponsorship without full disclosure of interests
There are a number of exhibits sponsored by big names in pharma. Though their names are clearly displayed within the relevant rooms, their interests are not too clear to those who may not work in the industry, as I do. Should you really be learning about pain medication from Eli Lilly, who has a financial stake in prescribing more of them? Other interests include Stryker (orthopedic devices), Gilead (HIV/​AIDS medication), and Alcon (ophthalmology). That’s not including the country-​specific rooms (Japan and Taiwan — but why is somewhere like Peru excluded, when they have multiple trepanation specimens from Incan times scattered throughout the museum?)
While I understand it is expensive to operate a museum in this location, the involvement of outside interests should more openly disclosed and explained.
3. Superficial exploration of topics
The orthopedic section only touched on a few instruments from Stryker vs the variety of diseases and conditions that are usually treated surgically, and this area omitted (perhaps by design) other instruments and technology within this field.
And what about the other areas of surgical science that have been excluded? Why was there not even a small paragraph and picture of the Da Vinci machine, an important step forward in the future of robotic surgery?
In summary, the IMSS had so much potential but fell far short of what could have been.

I must say this was one interesting/​fun experience, this is one unique museum to visit and is next to the polish embassy kinda easy to miss. They offer and Coat rack and restrooms on every floor, this museum consist of 4 floors but but very expansive as I expected. I enjoyed the walk around this place. Prices are affordable.

I don’t know what took me so long to come visit. As a medicine enthusiast I was at awe at every bit of the museum. Smaller museum but very educational to say the least.
Took a friend here from out of town and a friend who was taking boards the day after. Both enjoyed and was the perfect relaxing day for my friend before his board exam :)
No parking around. Took forever and just decided to pay for parking a few blocks down. Also, don’t forget to bring your student ID, I think it’s about $ 5 discount.

Boring, huge amount of space for such limited artifacts.

Be prepared to take a step back and be grateful for modern medicine. It’s amazing to see how far we have come between surgery and medicine itself. This museum exhibits progress throughout time. Give yourself an hour if you glance and two if you read. It’s tucked away in a non-​obvious building, but it’s worth the trip, especially on a cold winter day.

I’ve been itching to come here for sometime now and finally made it this week. I was a little worried when I got here that there would not be enough to see but I spent a couple hours here. It’s fascinating to see the antique surgical equipment, eyeglasses, & specimens. The murals are really beautiful too. And lastly, even if you don’t need it, take the elevator all the way to the top and all the way down. It’s an antique and it’s fun!

The IMSS has a diverse collection of equipment, specimen, documents, artworks, and images spanning a vast timeline. True to its name, the museum provides an INTERNATIONAL history of medicine and surgical science that extends beyond just a Western historical narrative.
I did find the downstairs room (across from the front desk) to be far too text-​heavy, and the information in this room could be broken up. While I liked the design of the text panels themselves, the information would be more engaging and palatable if presented through a variety of channels instead of through text alone. For example: video, audio, interactive media (digital, ie. touch screen, and/​or analog, ie. 3d models). Overall, though, the museum employs several different methods of display, so it is digestible for people with various learning styles.
I let out an audible gasp when I stumbled into the turn-​of-​the-​century apothecary. What an incredible and comprehensive collection! The accompanying audio was both approachable and informative. The only thing it’s missing is some old fashioned soda! Gift shop idea?!
We didn’t budget enough time when we visited the IMSS. The museum is larger than I thought it would be, and each exhibit held my attention for longer than I expected. I will definitely need to return to explore the rest of the museum and refresh my experience of the things I’ve already seen.

It was really long and informative. If you have a background in science, already, you will definately learn something new. If you don’t, there’s a lot of information. New information, not just history. It was not really what I expected. There were paintings and also statues. Galleries were very specific and topic focused. They had a lot to look at and a lot on display. It is not for children for reasons other than its length. It is good but not for a large city like Chicago. I guess its good for a free attraction considering eveything else is really expensive.

So I’m a nursing student and a lifelong lover of all things nerdy so this was right up my alley. I came here with a friend on a Wednesday afternoon and we almost had the place to ourselves. There were a few other visitors but we rarely saw anyone. I found the old time pharmacy to be very interesting, as well as all the old medical equipment. It blows my mind the things people used to endure! I only wish they had more of those old artifacts. I feel like a lot of the museum was posters and pictures. Also, I do wish they had more information on neurology or psych. Both would be an interesting addition!

We went here with a living social deal– two tickets for $ 15. For that price, it was worth it, but otherwise I’d find it expensive for the amount you did or didn’t see. I enjoyed the apothecary room that actually had a little sound byte explaining how medications used to be made and regulated. COOL.
There were other cool rooms too– the hall of immortals was interesting, with legendary people from the surgical field carved into giant statues, and the room about nursing made me proud, as I am a nurse.
That being said, I was hypercritical of other rooms– there was one room with some posters about different medical professions you could do. It seemed like an advertisement than an exhibit! And the cardiovascular surgery room was a HUGE let down. They had a few pacemakers and defibrillators in there, but really not much else. I think that room had so much potential!
Also noted was a few blocked off rooms that were empty but maybe in the beginning stages of a new exhibit? There was potential for more things, and I wish there was! We looked at everything pretty thoroughly and it took us about 1:15 to cover it all. There are 4 floors, and I did not note an elevator, so I’m sure about handicap access.
It was an OK experience, but did not blow me away overall.

An odd museum with mish-​mash of exhibits that alternate between fascinating medical history (my favorite was on eyeglasses) and advertisements dressed up like actual museum exhibits (like the room on the glories of Taiwanese medicine).
It’s in a cool old mansion on Lake Shore Drive, and is worth a visit if you’ve lived in Chicago a while and seen most of the other museums. I can’t imagine going back unless there is a specific event happening there.

So I am a medical geek. Like, huge. I’m also a nursing student. This place interested me greatly, especially because it is free on Tuesdays, and that is the day we were available to go.
There are a lot of interesting things in this museum. However, if I’d had to pay for the experience, I wouldn’t have been very happy – a lot of the exhibits were either gone or «in progress.» Don’t be fooled by the photos on this Unilocal page, the exhibits with the bodies are no longer there. Very disappointing.
So if you have a few hours to kill on a Tuesday, by all means, go to this museum. But until they get their exhibits back, I would absolutely not pay the $ 15 admission.

An interesting way to spend an afternoon! The museum is in a great rehabbed mansion. They have lots of info, art, and exhibits! Am I wrong to have wanted more? Well we weren’t disappointed except when it came to parking, being in Hyde Park and the lake is across the street. Take the bus and Enjoy!

Spent a couple of hours here on a Saturday afternoon, nice Lake Shore Drive location. I had a LivingSocial deal for 2 for 1 entry, which I feel was a much better admission point for the size and collection.
Pros: We live now and do not have to have some of these torture devices aka medieval medical equipment used on us. Cool (and slightly gross) exhibits showing tools and things removed from human bodies, and some artifacts from important persons in medicine like Florence Nightengale, Lister, etc.
Cons: We live now and yet they are still using some of these bone saws and such?! Also, if you’re not into reading the fine print on all the plaques, there are very few interactive things here.