Brief History

DEAPRTMENT OF MEDICAL BIOCHEMISTRY

The Medical Biochemistry Department, hitherto the Ghana Medical School Department of Biochemistry started in 1964 as a unit within the then Department of Biochemistry, Nutrition and Food Science, Faculty of Science, Legon. In 1971 a separate Department of Biochemistry based on the main campus, Legon, was established by the Faculty of Science. Subsequently, the Medical School Biochemistry unit became part of this new Department.
Professor G.S Asante was appointed to head the new Department. Due to the physical distance between the Legon campus and the University of Ghana Medical School (UGMS), Korle-Bu, and for effective administration, Professor Dr. Dr. BYA Andoh was appointed to act as the head of medical school unit, and tasked to coordinate the teaching of human biochemistry to medical and dental students. A number of academic senior members included K K Oduro, D.R Mobbs, Rose Forgey, Muriel Pappoe, and Fred Ofosu were employed to help Professor Andoh teach the subject of human biochemistry. The foundation laboratory technicians who worked with Prof. Andoh and his team were W.H Blankson, Fred Adzorah and James Boye.
Since the existence of the hitherto UGMS and SBAHS, the Department has produced two vice-deans (Vice-Dean, UGMS and Vice-Dean, Medical Education, CHS) and a Deputy/Acting Provost, CHS Two senior members of the Department have headed the Department of Chemical Pathology.

Notable Achievements
• The Department has graduated over 20 M.Phil. students.
• The Department has had collaborations with University of Leeds, UK, University of Virginia, USA and Tulane University, USA.
• The Department Medical Biochemistry has since its inception also offered a limited range of laboratory services mainly to the Medical School Clinic of the College of Health Sciences, Korle-Bu, patients visiting the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH), and more recently a number of clinical research projects being conducted by staff and students of the College of Health Sciences.
Clinical laboratory facilities in the Department under the supervision of the Head of Department, is served by experienced Medical Technologists, and technicians. The following laboratory services have been being offered from time to time:
• Malaria diagnosis
• Basic Clinical Chemistry test panels
• Basic Hematology
• Urinalysis

Head of Department of Medical Biochemistry (till date)
a. Prof. Dr. Dr. B. Y. A. Andoh (1964 - 1981)
b. Prof. Norman Woolhouse (1981 – 1988)
c. Prof. S. Asante-Poku (1988 – 2000)
d. Dr. S. Y. Oppong (2001 – 2002)
e. Prof. S. Asante-Poku (2003 – 2005)
f. Prof. I. K. E. Quaye (2005 – 2009)
g. Dr. Barth Dzudzor (2010 – 2015)
h. Dr. Nii Ayite. Aryee (2015 to date)

The present autonomous Department of Medical Biochemistry of the School of Allied health sciences (SBAHS) was established in 1998. It has its own administrative structures and runs academic programs for the pre-clinical science BSc. (Medical Science) degree and post graduate training programs leading to the award of the MPhil degree. The Department also offers support in terms of teaching and supervision of students’ projects to several programs in the College of Health Sciences, the Ghana and the West African Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons.
The Medical Biochemistry Department has since its existence produced two vice deans (Vice-Dean, UGMS and Vice-Dean, Medical Education, CHS) and a Deputy/Acting Provost, CHS. Two senior members of the department have headed the Department of Chemical Pathology.