The National Museum of Health and Medicine (NMHM) is a museum in Silver Spring, Maryland

Silver Spring, Maryland

Silver Spring is an unincorporated area and census-designated place in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. It had a population of 71,452 at the 2010 census, making it the fourth most populous place in Maryland, after Baltimore, Columbia, and Germantown.The urbanized, oldest, and...

, near Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

, USA. An element of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology

Armed Forces Institute of Pathology

The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology was a US government institution concerned with diagnostic consultation, education, and research in the medical specialty of pathology. It was founded in 1862 as the Army Medical Museum and was located in Washington, DC on the grounds of the Walter Reed Army...

(AFIP), the NMHM is a member of the National Health Sciences Consortium.

The museum was founded by U.S. Army Surgeon General William A. Hammond

William Alexander Hammond

William Alexander Hammond, M.D. was an American neurologist and the 11th Surgeon General of the U.S. Army...

 as the Army Medical Museum (AMM) in 1862; it became the NMHM in 1989.
The AMM was established during the American Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

 as a center for the collection of specimens for research in military medicine and surgery.