In 1898, the Norman Territorial University (later known as the University of Oklahoma) created a Premedical Department within the College of Arts. This new division offered a course covering the first two years of medical school instruction. 

Not long after, the university would establish Oklahoma’s first medical school. The School of Medicine (later the College of Medicine) opened on the Norman campus in 1900, providing basic sciences education across a two-year preclinical course, just as the earlier division had done. 

Eight students enrolled in the School of Medicine during the 1900-1901 academic year. Lawrence Northcote Upjohn, M.D., served as the inaugural leader of both the school and its first academic department: the Department of Anatomy. He later departed from the school in 1904.

While the university initially offered just the first two years of medical education, interest in establishing a full program soon followed. In 1903, a group of physicians met with Dr. Upjohn to discuss the prospect of creating a four-year medical college in Oklahoma City tied to the Territorial University. But the physicians failed to win Dr. Upjohn over, and the university shelved the idea.

Another opportunity later arrived. The Epworth College of Medicine had been established in Oklahoma City in 1904, making it the first four-year medical school in Oklahoma. However, its leaders had trouble managing its rapid growth, and the University of Oklahoma presented a solution: friendly takeover. The two sides negotiated an agreement for the School of Medicine to absorb the Epworth College of Medicine, its students and its faculty.

This merger finally established a four-year, degree-granting medical school at OU. The first two years of instruction remained at Norman, while the final two years, focused on clinical training, took place in Oklahoma City. The first doctor of medicine degrees were conferred by the School of Medicine in 1911.

Over the next two decades, the full School of Medicine experience would eventually centralize in Oklahoma City. A major step toward that took place in 1919, when University Hospital opened as the first building on what is now known as the Health Campus. As Oklahoma’s first state-owned teaching hospital, it would endure for decades.

It wasn’t always smooth sailing. In 1923, state lawmakers appropriated funding for a new preclinical building in Norman for the school. Dean Leroy Long, M.D., and other school leaders had sought to unify the medical education in Oklahoma City. The dean would eventually get his wish: in 1927, two years after the new Norman building opened, the legislature provided money for a medical school building on the Oklahoma City campus.

The School of Medicine building was completed in 1928, becoming the first facility to host all four years of OU’s medical instruction. That same year, the Crippled Children’s Hospital (now known as Oklahoma Children’s Hospital OU Health) opened on the campus, providing the school with two teaching hospitals. The two buildings received a joint dedication.

In 1972, the Oklahoma legislature enacted Senate Bill 453 to create the Tulsa Medical College, now known as the OU School of Community Medicine. As a clinical branch of the College of Medicine open to third- and fourth-year medical students, it became the University of Oklahoma’s second academic program in Tulsa, alongside classes held by the School of Library and Information Studies. The medical school’s first classes began in 1974.

OU’s presence in Tulsa grew over the next decades, though it remained decentralized. A transformative $10 million gift in 1999 from the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation accelerated the evolution of OU in Tulsa, allowing the university to purchase 60 acres that would become the Schusterman Center campus. since 2002, the medical school has been located on the campus with the rest of OU's Tulsa offerings.

In 2008, the single largest one-time gift in OU history revolutionized the medical school. The George Kaiser Family Foundation’s $50 million contribution established it as the nation’s first school of community medicine, focused on improving health outcomes for underserved communities. A year later, OU and the University of Tulsa announced plans to collaborate on establishing a four-year program at the school. The first students on a four-year track were welcomed in 2015.

During a period of financial difficulty for many teaching hospitals in the U.S., OU’s university hospital and children’s hospital entered into a joint operating agreement with Columbia/HCA Healthcare Corp., which took effect in 1998. This public-private partnership preserved the College of Medicine’s mission of providing medical education, conducting research and offering indigent care.

In 2018, the University Hospitals Authority and Trust, a state agency created to facilitate the partnership, boldly purchased the corporation’s stake in the hospitals and transferred ownership to the nonprofit OU Medicine Inc. Approved by the OU Board of Regents, this new entity reclaimed local ownership and management, allowing for greater investment in its healthcare mission. 

Finally, in 2021, the University of Oklahoma achieved unification through an agreement with the University Hospitals Authority and Trust. OU Medicine Inc. merged with the state-run OU Physicians group, creating OU Health: the state’s first comprehensive academic health system. This new organization aligned the executive and financial operations of the College of Medicine’s faculty practice with hospitals and other entities.

The College of Medicine celebrated its 125^th anniversary in 2025. That milestone reflects both a legacy of outstanding medical education and discovery science, and an enduring commitment to Oklahoma.

A year earlier, the University of Oklahoma Board of Regents approved a plan to gradually increase enrollment in the college’s Doctor of Medicine program. From 2024 to 2029, the number of annual admissions will rise by more than 40%, addressing a key need for state healthcare professionals. About half of all physicians who graduate from OU practice in Oklahoma.

Beginning in 2025, the College of Medicine implemented a new student curriculum centered on active learning and earlier clinical rotations, marking a radical academic transformation. This change comes after several years of planning and adds OU to a growing number of schools going beyond the traditional approach to medical education to strengthen the career readiness and success of students.

The college’s momentum continued into 2026 when the University of Oklahoma announced the launch of Project 200. Through this generational investment, approximately 200 world-renowned researchers will be recruited to the university. Health researchers, representing 150 of the 200 planned hires, will help advance life-altering research with the ultimate goal of elevating the health of Oklahoma.