Robert Alexander Bremner was a consultant orthopaedic and trauma surgeon at York County Hospital and then York City General Hospital. He was born in Alloa, Scotland, the son of two schoolteachers. He attended Alloa Academy and then the University of Edinburgh, where he qualified in medicine in 1947. He then carried out his National Service, mainly in Northern Ireland, leaving as a captain. He held junior posts in Leeds and around the UK and was then a resident surgical officer at Wolverhampton Royal Infirmary and a registrar at the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital at Oswestry. In 1953 he became a senior registrar at Middlesex Hospital, London, where he stayed for five years. During this time he went to the US to train in the latest operating techniques. In 1958 he was appointed as a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at York County Hospital and in 1977 moved to York City General Hospital, where he helped in the planning of the outpatient department. He carried out the first successful elbow replacement surgery in York and was known for his expertise in microsurgery, especially mending badly damaged hand tendons. In 1981 he led the surgical team that operated on the champion jockey Willie Carson who had fallen during the Yorkshire Oaks race and had sustained severe injuries, including a fractured skull. After retiring in 1985, Bremner spent 12 years working on medical tribunals. In 1962 he married Ruth. They had four children – Juliet, Alison, William and Harriet – and seven grandchildren. He died on 30 June 2017 aged 92 after a long illness.