Tony Chant was a consultant vascular surgeon in Southampton, Hampshire. He was born in Pembroke, West Wales. His father, Percival James Chant, was a Royal Air Force engineer who worked on Sunderland flying boats at the outbreak of the Second World War. He was then posted to Hitchin, Hertfordshire, where Tony grew up. Tony’s mother was Ethel Helen Chant née Quick. His careers tutor at Hitchin Grammar School advised him against surgery, saying that he had once been into an operating theatre as a student and ‘it smelt abominably’. Tony went to London to study medicine at the Royal Free Hospital Medical School. He failed his first-year exams, found himself looking for employment in London and soon landed a job at King’s College on the Strand as a physiology laboratory technician. Here he worked for St John Buxton on early radioisotope studies of capillary permeability. Also around this time, he taught history of music at his brother Derek’s school. The headmaster here noted Tony’s flair for teaching. This break gave him the opportunity to study again for his first MB. He was successful this time and shortly after gained entry to St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School. While there, he married Ann Venning (in 1959), the daughter of an antiques dealer from Hitchin, Hertfordshire. As a result of more stability in his life, things began to turn around and Tony found himself in the top 5% of his year and was invited to study for an intercalated BSc in physiology, working under the tutelage of ‘Mac’ Macdonald and Elizabeth Ulmond. Three other students were selected: the ‘Powles Twins’ (Ray and Trevor) and Hugh Phillips. All four ended up travelling to America on a scholarship to work as technicians in physiology departments. Here, Tony met Seymour S Kety, who was using radioisotopes to study blood flow, and a lifelong interest in blood flow and vascular physiology developed. After qualifying in 1964, he started work as a house surgeon to G W Taylor, followed by a series of junior surgical roles in north London hospitals. He then went to Cardiff and worked under the supervision of H O Jones and Archie Cochrane as a research fellow. He contributed to an early randomised trial of venous sclerotherapy against venous surgery. After demonstrating no difference between liquid sclerotherapy and surgery, it was deemed that sclerotherapy was the preferred treatment on the basis that it was cheaper. After two years of follow up, it became apparent that the results of the surgical arm were superior, leading to a retraction of the paper and a valuable lesson to all those involved. His personal research in Cardiff, eventually leading to the award of his MS thesis, involved assessment of lower limb venous function by the study of radioisotope clearance. With his research complete and some further basic surgical experience in South Wales, he moved on the Royal United Hospital, Bath, where he had the some of his happiest memories of work and life in general. He worked for Howell Thomas ‘Johnnie’ John, a fearless ex-pilot and surgeon, and became a competent surgical registrar. Ever on and upwards, he landed a senior lecturer post with Sir James Fraser in the newly-founded Southampton Medical School. Two years later, he was working for John Webster and not long afterwards was appointed as a consultant surgeon (with a vascular interest) in Southampton in 1974. There he developed a national reputation for treatment, training and research in vascular surgery. Having been a tutor from the outset of the Southampton Medical School, he began to realise that medical education could be reorganised to allow doctors, nurses and managers to start from a common root, to branch out and develop into whatever area of healthcare interested them. The concept of ‘the stem doctor’ was developed and published, and elements of his theory are developing traction in today’s healthcare education. He published in many areas, but it was his passion for venous pathology that led to the award of a Royal College of Surgeons’ Hunterian chair. He was a founding member of the Joint Vascular Research Group and enjoyed an active role in the Vascular Society of Great Britain and Ireland (VSGBI) and the Association of International Vascular Surgeons. After struggling to raise funding specifically for vascular research, he set up the British Vascular Foundation, later renamed the Circulation Foundation when it was adopted as the charitable arm of the VSGBI. For his all-round contribution to vascular surgery he received a lifetime achievement award from the VSGBI. He was the model of a lifelong learner; he was awarded an MA in philosophy from the Open University and published his work criticising the unscientific concept of ‘thought experiments’. Tony was a talented pianist and enjoyed singing – whether in church or his favourite pub, the Newport Inn. When he was younger, he played squash to a high standard in the rather warm courts in Barts, built next to the boilers. During his consultant years he became an accomplished chalk stream angler with a keen eye for the larger River Test trout. More latterly, his gardening became more important and he was the recipient of three Royal Horticultural Society medals. Tony Chant died on 20 February 2020 at the age of 81. He was survived by his wife Ann, three sons and seven grandchildren.