Our history is our future
History
Foundation IRCCS Ca' Granda Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico, known simply as Policlinico of Milan, is a general hospital that can count on important excellence in different areas of care with a strong interdisciplinary focus.
Founded by Duke Francesco Sforza more than 500 years ago, it is among the oldest hospitals in Italy. In its six centuries of activity it has accompanied the Milanese in their course of treatment, making medical history and anticipating various innovations always in step with the times.
The Policlinico has benefited by some great names in science such as Carlo Forlanini (inventor of the artificial pneumothorax), Edoardo Porro (innovator in Cesarian section operation procedure), Baldo Rossi (founding father of emergency surgery and Ernest Hemingway’s surgeon), Luigi Mangiagalli (founder of the obstetrics gynaecology clinic named after him and founding father of many innovations in the field of gynaecology), Carlo Lorenzo Cazzullo (innovator and master of Italian psychiatry) and many others.
The Benefactors
Since its founding, the Polyclinic has been supported by donations and bequests from its Benefactors.
This tradition of charity and the citizens' sense of belonging to our Hospital are still alive today, so much so that since 1456 there has been an incalculable number of benefactors who, in addition to a financial contribution, have donated to the Policlinico an extraordinary wealth of works of art that contribute to enriching the hospital's historical archives.
Today
Given its nature as IRCCS – Institute for Research, Hospitalization and Health Care - in addition to care, it carries out biomedical and health research activities of a clinical and translational nature, that is, involving the rapid transfer of therapies from the laboratories to the bedside of the sick person. The research activity is conducted in the different fields of medicine, from neurology to cardiology, from transplantation to hematology, to excellence of care in gynecology, neonatology, geriatrics and rare diseases. The Ministry of Health has recognized the Policlinico as the First Public Institute for the quantity and quality of scientific production.
The Policlinico is a reference within National and International networks of research and treatment. In fact it is a reference for pregnancies and treatment of women’s pathologies that are handled at its Mangiagalli Clinic, which has the most active obstetrics gynaecology first aid in Lombardy. The Hospital is also home to the Nord Italia Transplant program (NITp), that, from 1972 to date, has made possible over 32 thousand organ transplants, with success rates at one year from transplant that exceed 90%. The Policlinico further stands out for being the regional Centre of reference for the treatment of rare diseases, where experts are able to follow over 300 pathologies of the adult and child. Every year, in average, about 3.000.000 outpatient services, and about 46.000 hospitalizations.
It is a university center and offers, in addition to the master's degree program in Medicine, nine health care degrees (Dental Hygiene, Nursing, Pediatric Nursing, Orthoptics and Ophthalmic Care, Obstetrics, Audiometric Techniques, Hearing Aid Techniques, Biomedical Laboratory Techniques and Medical Radiology, Imaging and Radiation Therapy Techniques) and the master's degree program in Preventive Health Professions.
Future
Today, the Policlinico is in a phase of great transformation: in fact, in 2014, a Real Estate Fund was created to finance the construction of the new hospital through the ethical enhancement of its real estate assets. This is a historic project: rebuilding a hospital is already an exceptional work in itself, rebuilding it by financing it through a social housing fund while upgrading its real estate assets is more unique than rare.
Updated at 16:09 on 27/03/2025