John Kirk was a consultant plastic surgeon at the Tayside Regional Plastic Surgery Unit. He was born in Edinburgh on 23 June 1922, but spent most of the first six years of his life in China, where his mother and father, also John Kirk, were medical missionaries. The family returned to the UK in 1928

David Greatrex Maurice was a consultant plastic surgeon at the regional plastic surgery unit in the Newcastle and Hartlepool Hospitals Group and then at Sharoe Green Hospital, Preston. He studied medicine at St Mary's Hospital Medical School, London, and qualified with the conjoint diploma in 1943.