John Dermot Ainslie Common was a consultant ophthalmic surgeon at North Staffordshire Royal Infirmary. He studied medicine at Westminster Hospital, where he qualified in 1971. Following his house appointment at the King Edward VII Hospital, Windsor, he went to Sierra Leone, where he worked on and wrote about onchocerciasis or ‘river blindness’. His formal ophthalmological training began in 1976 as a registrar at the Western Ophthalmic Hospital, followed by a senior registrar post at Birmingham and Midland Eye Hospital. He was then appointed consultant ophthalmic surgeon to North Staffordshire Royal Infirmary in 1984, where he had an active interest in anterior segment surgery and ocular trauma. He retired in 2003 due to ill health. In retirement he maintained his sporting interests despite an above the elbow amputation of the left arm due to sarcoma – driving around the Nürburgring race track in Germany in less than nine minutes and big game hunting in Zambia using a rifle single armed. He married Terri, but was widowed. He died suddenly of a stroke on 8 April 2005.