Born 8 November 1921 in Melbourne, the son of Arthur Ernest Bedbrook, a gardener, and Ethel Nora Prince. George Bedbrook was educated at the State School, Coburg, the University High School, Melbourne, and the medical school of the University of Melbourne. There he won honours in every subject in the course, and won the J P Ryan Scholarship in surgery. After house appointments in Melbourne he joined the RANVR but was discharged as being medically unfit, whereupon he joined the RAAF Reserve. In 1950 he obtained the FRACS, and came to the UK where he was RMO at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital and was much influenced by Professor J I P James of Edinburgh, Sir Henry Osmond-Clarke of the London Hospital, and, particularly, Sir Ludwig Guttman of Stoke Mandeville. He then returned to private practice and the orthopaedic department, Royal Perth Hospital, where he started a paraplegic service in 1954 and was soon acknowledged as a leader in this field. He helped organise the first Commonwealth Paraplegic Games in Perth in 1963, gave many prestigious lectures and received the medal of honour from the International Society of Paraplegia. Bedbrook wrote more than 100 papers and two books on spinal cord injuries and paraplegia and was knighted in 1978. He had a forceful personality, and demanded the best care for his patients. In 1946 he married Jessie Violet Page, who died on 8 September 1989. They had three daughters, two sons and fifteen grandchildren. He died of a severe cerebral haemorrhage on 6 October 1991.