A number of documentary sources (mainly wills, bequests, inventories etc.) and medieval Sardinian laws have provided us with information about the doctors and surgeons working on the island of Sardinia. We cannot, however, be certain that a School of Medicine existed. We do know that in the Sixteenth century the Commune of Sassari paid a doctor to give private lessons in medicine at his own home. In 1558, the Sassari town council paid a lecturer in medicine to give anatomy lessons and carry out an autopsy on a cadaver at least once a year. At that time, young Sardinians who wished to become doctors had to attend universities in Italy (particularly Pisa) or Spain.

Students who wished to become surgeons had to follow a different path. In this case, the young person had to bind themselves (in other words they had to sign a sort of written contract) to a master surgeon for a period of five years. They served this time in the master's home and learnt their trade directly in the master's laboratory. At their end of his apprenticeship, the young man was examined by a special board before being allowed to practice his profession. The field of medical and surgical qualifications was a very grey area and this meant that a vast array of quacks and unscrupulous doctors were able to practice alongside properly qualified surgeons. At that time, barbers were legally allowed to carry out minor surgery (bandaging, external dressings, blood-letting, tooth pulling etc.) and sometimes acted, like the doctors and surgeons themselves, as legal witnesses in the case of suspicious injury, poisoning, violent death and so on. Because this situation constituted a grave risk to public health, attempts were made to remedy matters by making the work of barber-surgeons and surgeons subject to the approval of doctors. One step forward was the institution of a Chief Medical Examiner's Office (1455) as the highest authority in the field of health. The Chief Medical Examiner was resident in Cagliari and responsible for examining prospective surgeons and pharmacists before deciding whether or not they were good enough to enter the profession. The next positive step was the setting up of the "Confraternity of Saints Cosmas and Damian" (1631), the first proper association of doctors and surgeons.

The association Statute stated that young people who wished to become surgeons had to be able to read and write and had to serve under a properly qualified surgeon for a period of five years. At the end of their apprenticeship, newly qualified surgeons had to attend lessons in Anatomy and Surgery at the local university for a further three years. No surgeon was able to open a laboratory without an examination licence signed by the Maggiorale (chief surgeon) of the association.

The theoretical and practical knowledge of doctors, and surgeons in particular, did not improve significantly until the Faculty of Medicine and the School of Surgery were set up. In Cagliari, the Faculty of Medicine began to operate more or less regularly in 1626, the year when the local University was officially inaugurated. In 1678, a new law prohibited graduate doctors from practising their profession until they had spent two years training in hospitals or three years working in the surgery of an experienced doctor. The medical and surgical studios (and the University itself) failed to thrive during the period of Spanish dominion. Only when Sardinia passed into the hands of the Savoys (1720) did order began to emerge from the chaos within the field of medical and surgical training. As far as the surgical profession in Europe and the Italian states was concerned, the eighteenth century represented a century of professional and social rehabilitation and of deep-seated scientific renewal.

A deep-rooted form of rejection toward surgeons persisted until the end of the Nineteenth century in Sardinia, particularly in rural areas, where surgery was considered a dishonorable profession reserved for people of humble rank.
In 1759, Count Tana, the Viceroy of Sardinia, issued a public edict to order the setting up of a surgery department under the direction of Professor Michele Plazza from Turin. The professor was responsible for giving lessons in the Italian language (not the Spanish in current use prior to that time) and to take personal responsibility for surgical and anatomical training. The Piedmontese government also decided to put an end for once and for all to poor professional practice in surgery. Viceroy Tana issued another public edict in 1761, which ordered much stricter controls over the professional practices of surgeons, blood-letters and midwives.

It was established, for example, that blood-letters were not allowed to practice in places where a qualified surgeon was practising.
An important date for Cagliari University and the Faculty of Medicine and the School of Surgery was 1764, the year the University of Cagliari was granted its royal Charter. Under the terms of this order, the Faculty of Medicine was divided into four departments: anatomy, theoretical and practical medicine, medical basic principles and materia medica (pharmacology). The surgery course, which lasted two years, was taught by two departments: anatomical and surgical basic principles, and surgery. In 1822, Charles Felix ordered that the School of Surgery should became the Faculty of Surgery. Two new departments were added during the same year: Clinical Medicine (Faculty of Medicine) and Clinical Surgery (Faculty of Surgery). The Faculties of Medicine and Surgery were still separate in 1852.

Lastly, in 1857, the two Faculties were combined to
form the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery. Six courses were taught, as follows:

YEAR 1: chemistry; natural history; anatomy;
YEAR 2: chemistry; anatomy; medical and surgical basic principles;
YEAR 3: anatomy; theoretical and practical pharmacy; materia medica; theoretical and practical medicine; theoretical and practical surgery; clinical medicine;
YEAR 4: same courses as third year plus clinical surgery;
YEAR 5-6: theoretical and practical medicine; theoretical and practical surgery; clinical medicine; clinical surgery; surgical and obstetric operations; toxicology; hygiene and police medicine or forensic medicine.