The department was founded in 1958.
The department was headed by Full Professor I. P. Lerner (1958-1961), Full Professor G. A. Dashtayants (1962-1978), Full Professor Ye. V. Andrushchenko (1978-1996), since 1996 the department has been headed by Full Professor N. I. Shvets.
The department’s teaching staff created the first national teaching programs for training therapists to be certificated for obtaining the qualification grades and for therapy interns. For the first time in Ukraine there were prepared computer tests on internal medicine for pre-certification courses.
Since the department’s foundation over 15.000 doctors have advanced their skills; thousands of patients were given consultations.
In 2000 there were developed a fundamentally new certification test system on therapy, the curricula and specialization programs in therapy, as far as on the internship, pre-certification courses, the course of thematic advanced training "Pharmacotherapy of the Internal Diseases", which are constantly renewed.
On the 13th -14th of November, 2008 there was held a jubilee scientific and practical conference dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the department titled "Current problems of diagnosis, treatment and prevention in the clinical picture of the internal diseases " (Kyiv, sanatorium "Pushcha-Oziornaia"), which was attended by over 300 delegates from all regions of Ukraine.