Search Results for Medical Obituaries - Narrowed by: Thoracic surgeon

First Title value, for Searching Daws, Joyce Margaretta (1925 - 2007)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2021-03-22
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009900-E009999
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Dame Joyce Daws was a consultant thoracic surgeon in Melbourne.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009948
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Pagliero, Keith Michael (1938 - 2023)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2023-12-19
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010500-E010599
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Keith Michael Pagliero was a consultant thoracic surgeon at the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010582
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Salama, Fayek Dimitri ( - 2023)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2023-08-15
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010400-E010499
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Fayek Dimitri Salama was a consultant thoracic surgeon at the City Hospital, Nottingham. This is a draft obituary. If you have any information about this surgeon, or are interested in writing this obituary, please email lives@rcseng.ac.uk.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010430
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bell, Leighton Craig (1923 - 2013)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2013-06-12 2015-06-05
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004000-E004099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/376260376260
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Leighton Craig Bell was a consultant general surgeon at Pontefract, Castleford and Goole hospitals. He was born in Bangor, County Down, Northern Ireland, on 17 February 1923 and studied medicine at Queen's University Belfast, qualifying MB BCh BAO in 1945. He gained his FRCS in 1952. Prior to his consultant appointment, he was a senior surgeon to the government of Bahrain, a senior registrar in thoracic surgery to Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, and a research fellow in thoracic surgery at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA. Leighton Craig Bell died on 5 May 2013 in Ramsey, Cambridge. He was 90.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004077
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Butchart, Eric Gordon (1943 - 2021)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2022-01-28
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010000-E010099
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Eric Butchart was a thoracic surgeon at the University Hospital of Wales, Cardiff. This is a draft obituary. If you have any information about this surgeon or are interested in writing this obituary, please email lives@rcseng.ac.uk
Resource Identifier RCS: E010059
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Richards, Harold Joseph (1919 - 1998)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2021-09-28
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010000-E010099
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Harold Richards was a consultant thoracic surgeon at the Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney. This is a draft obituary. If you have any information about this surgeon or are interested in writing this obituary, please email lives@rcseng.ac.uk
Resource Identifier RCS: E010004
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Perera, Thannipulliara-Chige Don H ( - 1976)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Brown, Michael Meredith (1918 - 2009)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Raymond Hurt
Publication Date 2010-09-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373203373203
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Michael Meredith Brown was a consultant thoracic surgeon at Midhurst Hospital. He was born on 1 May 1918 in Croydon, the first son of Bernard Meredith, an analytic chemist in the brewing industry, and Doris née Cortazzi, a bank clerk. He was educated at St Anselm’s Preparatory School, Croydon, Bradfield College, Berkshire, Jesus College, Cambridge, and then St Thomas’ Hospital, London, qualifying in 1942. Three years later, he obtained his fellowship of the College. He served in the RAF Volunteer Reserve as a squadron leader. After demobilisation and junior hospital posts, he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon at Midhurst Hospital and to the Army at the Cambridge Military Hospital, Aldershot. His most important publication was a chapter on oesophagoscopy in Rob and Smith’s *Operative surgery* (London, Butterworth, 1978). He married a Miss Woodward in 1942. They had two sons and two daughters.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001020
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fuller, Denis Norden (1917 - 2006)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2020-10-19
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009800-E009899
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Denis Norden Fuller was a consultant thoracic surgeon in Johannesburg, South Africa. He was born on 9 March 1917 in Boksburg, Transvaal, South Africa, the son of Harold Norden Fuller and Natalie Maud Courtney Fuller née Acutt. He was educated at Highbury in Natal and Kingswood College in Grahamstown and then studied medicine at Cape Town and at Guy’s Hospital Medical School in London. He qualified with the conjoint examination in 1940. During the Second World War he served in the South African Medical Corps and then went back to London for further training in surgery until 1948. He gained his FRCS in 1947. He subsequently returned to South Africa, where he was an assistant surgeon at Johannesburg General Hospital, and a consultant thoracic surgeon at Springkell Sanatorium, and in private practice. He retired at the end of 1973. In October 1939 he married Grace Baird Warren. Fuller died in 2006 at Trafalgar, KwaZulu-Natal.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009826
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching McAlpine, Wallace Arnold (1920 - 2021)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2021-05-05
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009900-E009999
Occupation Anatomist Cardiovascular surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Wallace McAlpine was a thoracic and cardiovascular surgeon who worked in Toledo, Ohio. This is a draft obituary. If you have any information about this surgeon or are interested in writing this obituary, please email lives@rcseng.ac.uk
Resource Identifier RCS: E009964
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Taitz, Solomon Reuben ( - 1970)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-10-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006100-E006199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378362378362
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Solomon Reuben Taitz studied at the University of Rand in South Africa, and gained the MB BCh in 1940. In 1951 he passed both the Membership and the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. He returned to South Africa and specialized in thoracic surgery. In October 1970 the College received a letter from a nephew advising that Solomon Rueben Taitz had died.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006179
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Dobson, Raymond (1919 - 2013)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2013-07-24 2015-07-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004200-E004299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/376453376453
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Raymond Dobson was a consultant thoracic surgeon who worked in the Newcastle upon Tyne region. He was born in Darlington on 24 October 1919, the son of Albert Dobson, an accountant in a bank, and Dorothy Dobson née Robson. He was educated at the Royal Grammar School in Newcastle and was then awarded an exhibition to St Catharine's College, Cambridge. He gained first class honours in his BA in natural sciences and then went on to clinical studies at Newcastle. He qualified MB BChir in 1942. He held house posts at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle, and then, in 1943, joined the RAMC. He was twice mentioned in despatches and left the Army in 1946 with the rank of major. Following his demobilisation, he returned to Newcastle, as a house surgeon and then a registrar. From 1950 to 1951 he was a registrar in the department of regional thoracic surgery, Newcastle. He was then a senior registrar in thoracic surgery for a year, working for the South East Metropolitan Region. In 1953 he was appointed to his consultant post at Newcastle. He was also a clinical lecturer at Newcastle University and a senior administrator in the cardiothoracic surgical department at Freeman Hospital (from 1978 to 1980). He retired in 1980. Outside medicine, he was interested in sport. As a young man he had played rugby for Cambridge University and Northumberland. He was chairman of the Two Castles Housing Association from 1975 to 1989. In February 1949 he married Mary (née Meikle). They had three children, Susan (who predeceased him), Simon (who became a paediatrician) and Andrew. Raymond Dobson died on 7 June 2013. He was 93.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004270
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barclay, Robert Christopher (1916 - 2009)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2012-02-06 2013-09-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001900-E001999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374150374150
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Robert Christopher Barclay was a consultant thoracic surgeon. Born on 2 April 1916 in Chippenham, he trained at St George's Hospital and qualified from Cambridge University in 1942. Passing the fellowship in 1946 he was house surgeon at St George's and then resident medical officer at the Royal Cancer Hospital. He moved to Oxford to become registrar at the Radcliff Infirmary before ending his medial career as consultant thoracic surgeon to the Nottingham City Hospital and associated Sanatoria. He was a fellow of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and a member of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons. He died at his home in Thurgarton, Notts on Friday 2 January 2009, aged 92 years, survived by a Robert E. Barclay who may have been his son. His wife, Gwendoline E. Barclay, was living at the same address in 2004 but it is not known if she survived him. Publications:- Operations for hernia: nylon darn technique. *Lancet* 1948 Solid sarcomatous pulmonary artery (jointly) *Brit j dis chest* 1960
Resource Identifier RCS: E001967
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching El-Khidir, Hisham Hassan (1962 - 2023)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2023-10-17
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010400-E010499
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Hisham Hassan El-Khidir was a consultant surgeon at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital. This is a draft obituary. If you have any information about this surgeon or are interested in writing this obituary, please email lives@rcseng.ac.uk
Resource Identifier RCS: E010488
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Zimmerman, Jacob ( - 1997)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-12-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009000-E009099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381192381192
Occupation Anatomist General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Jacob Zimmerman qualified from St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1943. He was a foundation member of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, a Fellow of the New York Academy of Science and an Hunterian Professor of our College in 1966. He was an assistant Professor of Anatomy and Surgery at the New York Medical College, and had been an adjunct in surgery at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. He was attending surgeon at St Barnabas Hospital in the Bronx, New York, before going to Tel Aviv to be Professor of Anatomy. He published extensively on the relief of mitral stenosis and the fibrous skeleton of the heart. He died in 1997.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009009
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Brewin, Ernest Garside (1920 - 2010)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2012-02-02 2014-01-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001900-E001999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374134374134
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Ernest Garside Brewin was a consultant thoracic and cardiovascular surgeon in Stoke-on-Trent and Stafford. He was born in Batley, Yorkshire, on 22 February 1930, the son of Willie Beaumont Brewin, a warehouse manager. His mother's maiden name was Garside. He was educated at Carlinghow Elementary School and then Batley Grammar School. He went on to study medicine in Leeds. He was a house surgeon at the General Infirmary in Leeds, and then a demonstrator in physiology at the University of Leeds. He subsequently became a research fellow in cardiovascular surgery at Guy's Hospital, a lecturer in surgery at the University of Glasgow, and assistant director on the surgical unit and a surgeon at St Thomas' Hospital, London. He was then appointed to his consultant post at Stoke-on-Trent and Stafford. He listed E R Flint in Leeds, P R Allison, Sir Charles Illingworth and Lord Brock as the surgeons who had most influenced him. He was interested in music and the history of mathematics and science. In 1950 he married Rhoda Eleanor Taylor. They had one daughter. Ernest Garside Brewin died on 26 September 2010, aged 80.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001951
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Doctor, Aspi Homi (1939 - 1995)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2016-03-24 2019-05-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009000-E009099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381273381273
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Aspi Homi Doctor was a thoracic surgeon in Fort Pierce, Florida. Born in Bombay on 4 September 1939 he was the third child and only son of Homi Doctor, a bank cashier, and his wife Mehra née Messman. Educated at St Sebastian High School, he then proceeded to the University of Bombay and studied medicine at Grant Medical College. He did house jobs at the Sir Jamshedjee Jeejeebhoy group of hospitals where he his surgical mentors were Lt. Col. D R Bharucha and M P Mehta. He travelled to the UK to further his studies. Awarded the Hallett Prize in 1969, he also won four gold medals for outstanding performance in the MS examination. He passed the college fellowship in 1972 and the fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in the same year. While in London he worked at Barts and the Brompton Hospitals where he was influenced by Lord Russell Brock and Oswald Sydney Tubbs. At the time of his early death he was practising as a thoracic surgeon in Fort Pierce, Florida. His interests were cricket, table tennis and swimming. When he died on 6 August 1995 aged 56 the Indian River State College in Fort Pierce inaugurated an annual Dr Aspi Doctor memorial swim in his honour which is still being held.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009090
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Pickering, Brian Neil ( - 2002)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-12-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008800-E008899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381028381028
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Brian Pickering studied medicine at Guy's Hospital where he qualified in 1956. After junior surgical posts he specialised in cardiothoracic surgery, doing the rotation between the Middlesex, Hammersmith and Harefield Hospitals and the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street. He was appointed consultant surgeon at Harefield and Colindale Hospitals, but then went to Plymouth as a consultant thoracic surgeon. He was civil consultant surgeon to the Royal Navy. He wrote extensively on the surgery of acute myocardial infarction. He died in Torquay on 20 May 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008845
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Logan, Andrew (1906 - 2005)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2014-12-24 2017-04-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006600-E006699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378789378789
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Andrew Logan was a pioneer of cardiothoracic surgery in Edinburgh. He was born in Dairsie, Fife on 6 November 1906. His family were farmers. He left school at 16 and went to St Andrews University, gaining an MA in 1926. He then turned to medicine, qualifying in 1929. He went on to train in Newcastle with George Mason, one of the pioneers of thoracic surgery and the pair carried out the first pneumonectomy in Britain. During the Second World War Logan was a military surgeon in Egypt. In 1948 he was invited to establish a thoracic surgical unit in Edinburgh and, with his colleagues, David Wade, Bobby McCormack and Philip Walbaum, provided an outstanding service for patients from south-east Scotland and further afield. At first they focused on surgery for tuberculosis and cancer of the lung and gullet, but later Logan gained an international reputation for developing an operation (transventricular mitral valvotomy) to correct the damage inflicted on the mitral heart valve during rheumatic fever. Following the introduction of the heart bypass machine, Logan also began to carry out open heart surgery. He carried out the world's second lung transplant. On his retirement in 1972, he left Edinburgh and joined Ben Le Roux in Durban, South Africa, where he taught for more than a decade. He was president of the Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery and the Scottish Thoracic Society. He was an honorary fellow of the American Thoracic Society. In 1974 he was awarded an honorary DSc by St Andrews. Outside medicine, he was interested in literature and language, the arts and the Scottish countryside. During the Second World War, he met and married Jo Littlewood. She predeceased him in 1980. He died on 9 September 2005, aged 98, and was survived by his two daughters, his son (who is also a surgeon), his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006606
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching MacHale, James Joseph (1915 - 2006)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2011-11-03 2014-10-17
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373666373666
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details James Joseph MacHale was a consultant thoracic surgeon in Birmingham. He was born in Westport, County Mayo, Ireland, on 25 August 1915, the son of Joseph Patrick MacHale, an insurance manager, and Grace MacHale née Moran, a housewife. He was educated at Blackrock College and then went on to University College and St Vincent's Hospital, Dublin. He gained honours in all his examinations and won the Richard Tobin junior prize, the special prize in surgery and the O'Ferrell gold medal in surgery. He qualified MB BCh BAO with first class honours in 1938. He was a house surgeon at St Vincent's and then went to England. He was a casualty officer and a house surgeon in Middlesborough, and then, in 1941, joined the Army. He served for four years as a senior surgeon for No 3 Hospital Company. Following his demobilisation, he was based at the Postgraduate Medical School of London. He also held a post at the London Chest Hospital. From 1947 to 1948, he carried out postgraduate work in Stockholm and Oslo. In 1948 he became an assistant thoracic surgeon in Birmingham, and later the same year was appointed to his consultant post. He retired in 1980. He was a member of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons and the Thoracic Society, and president of the Midland Thoracic Society in 1950. He married Marguerite Byrne in 1950. They had four children - Joseph, Jane, Clare and James. James Joseph MacHale died in July 2006 aged 90.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001483
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brunnen, Peter Lance (1917 - 2001)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2016-02-19 2016-05-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009000-E009099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381240381240
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Peter Lance Brunnen was a consultant thoracic surgeon to the North East Regional Hospital Board, Scotland. He was born in Rosyth, Scotland, on 19 July 1917. His father, John Ewart Brunnen, was an electrical engineer; his mother, Elsie Victoria Augusta Brunnen née Lance was the daughter of an inspector in the London Metropolitan Police. He was educated at Kingsbridge Grammar School, Devon, and then studied medicine at Aberdeen University, where he was a medallist in anatomy and qualified in 1939. After junior posts, he served during the Second World War from April 1942 to March 1947 as a captain and graded surgeon. After training in surgery, he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon to the North East Regional Hospital Board in Scotland and as a clinical senior lecturer in thoracic surgery at the University of Aberdeen. He wrote several papers on oesophageal problems. He listed two surgeons who had particularly influenced him - Lord Brock, with whom he worked when he was a cardiovascular research fellow (from 1951 to 1952), and W E Adams, a mentor when he was at the University of Chicago on a travelling fellowship from the American Association for Thoracic Surgery (from 1957 to 1958). Outside medicine, he enjoyed music, painting and languages. In 1943 he married Margaret Brown, the daughter of a GP in Aberdeen. They had two daughters and a son. Peter Lance Brunnen died in March 2001 at the age of 83.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009057
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Brown, James Howard (1922- 2007)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2020-10-19
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009800-E009899
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details James Howard Brown was a thoracic surgeon in Adelaide, South Australia. He was born on 8 November 1922 in Adelaide, the son of Thomas Howard Brown and Elsie Davey Brown née James. He was educated at the Christian Brothers College and Rostrevor College and went on to study medicine at the University of Adelaide. In September 1941 he enlisted as a private in the Australian Military Forces. After the Second World War, he went to the UK, where he trained in thoracic surgery in London, Oxford and Sheffield and gained his FRCS in 1950. While he was in Sheffield, he met Shelagh Hannath. They married at Claro, Yorkshire, in 1951. In 1953 Brown returned to Adelaide with his new wife. He was a thoracic surgeon at the Royal Adelaide, Children’s, the Queen Elizabeth and Calvary hospitals and taught students at the University of Adelaide. Also in 1953 he set up one of the first medical journal clubs. He worked in New Guinea several times as a visiting surgeon and is remembered there for his pioneering work in tuberculosis. Outside medicine he enjoyed playing golf and dancing. He was an excellent raconteur and speaker. For a time he grew grapes for wine with several friends. He had a passion for sports cars and was always interested in trying new things. James Howard Brown died on 19 April 2007. His son, Christopher, is an orthopaedic surgeon.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009808
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Callanan, John Gerald (1920 - 1985)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2015-04-27 2018-05-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007100-E007199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379351379351
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details John Gerald Callanan was born in Ennis, County Clare, on 21 June 1920, the son of John Callanan, a British Government Official, and his wife, Margaret. He spent his early years in England, returning for schooling to Mount Mellory where he attended the veterinary college for a while before transferring to medicine. He qualified in 1946 from the National University of Ireland and initially pursued a thoracic surgical career. He became surgical registrar at the London Chest Hospital, publishing an article on modified thoracoplasty with Thomas Holmes Sellors as a co-author. In 1955 he emigrated to the United States first becoming a resident at Bellevue Hospital, New York, but later moving to San Francisco where he practised general surgery for almost thirty years before he retired. For many years he was editor of the *San Francisco medical bulletin*. John Callanan was a keen traveller and an outstanding conversationalist who had wide intellectual interests. He was wintering on the Costa del Sol, Spain, when he died suddenly of a myorcardial infarction on 24 February 1985. He was survived by his wife, Irene, a Dublin girl whom he had met in New York at a party given by the Irish representative of the United Nations. There were no children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007168
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Polak, Emerich ( - 1980)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-02-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006800-E006899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379044379044
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Emerich Polak received his medical training in Prague and qualified in 1925. He continued his surgical training under Professor Rudolf Jedlicka and his first contact with English surgery was in 1926 when the Moynihan Travelling Club visited Prague. For forty years he directed an important surgical department developing a wide interest in surgery, particularly thoracic surgery, peptic ulceration and the pancreas. He contributed much to surgical publications and, in 1934, published a monograph on blood transfusion which introduced this new treatment to Czechoslovakia. Outside surgery, apart from entomology and botany, his chief interest was music. He was an accomplished violinist and played both classical and modern music. He was awarded the Honorary Fellowship on 9 July 1975; the citation was delivered by Ronald Raven and the President, Sir Rodney Smith, pointed out that he had first met Professor Polak in the garden where Mozart stayed when he was composing *Don Giovanni*. He died on 27 August 1980.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006861
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Parish, Christopher (1917 - 2014)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Rod Parkinson
Publication Date 2014-06-13 2015-08-07
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005400-E005499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377652377652
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Christopher Parish was the first cardiothoracic surgeon at Papworth Hospital, Cambridge. He was born in Withington, Manchester, the second of four children, and the only son, of Rachel and Reuben Parish. He attended Manchester Central High School and then the University of Manchester, where he gained a BSc before his completing medical studies, qualifying in 1940. In 1941 he joined the RAMC as a medical specialist, marrying Joan Dorothy Bell immediately before starting his duties overseas. He served in the 8th Army in the north African desert and then moved on to the landings at Salerno and Anzio in Italy. After the war, he held a number of positions at Manchester Royal Infirmary, gaining his fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1948. In 1950 he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon in Manchester. In 1952 he moved to Cambridge when he was appointed, initially as a thoracic surgeon, to the United Cambridge Hospitals and East Anglian Regional Hospital Board, the launch pad for his pioneering work at Papworth. He also lectured in thoracic surgery at the University of Cambridge and was appointed postgraduate dean for the University's school of clinical medicine and regional director for postgraduate medical education. In the early 1950s tuberculosis had largely been brought under control: Papworth was seeing fewer cases of TB while the number of cardiac patients on the waiting list was increasing. Parish was instrumental in establishing a specialist cardiothoracic surgery unit at Papworth. He convinced the Regional Health Authority that cardiac surgery required specialist support staff and clinicians, and Ben Milstein was recruited to develop open heart surgery at the hospital. Other cardiothoracic surgeons soon joined the team, eventually leading to the UK's first successful heart transplant and the world's first heart-lung-liver transplant. Papworth is today the UK's largest specialist cardiothoracic hospital. In 1968 Parish was elected as a fellow of Sidney Sussex College in Cambridge, initially as director of studies in medicine and later as keeper of the muniments and co-editor of the College *annual*. Outside medicine, Parish was a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London and president of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society and the Cambridgeshire Records Society. He took a lively interest in the community around his home and wrote up the history of the village of Boxworth. Parish was an active supporter of the Royal British Legion and was president of the Elsworth and district branch, before its merger with the Swavesey branch. During his leisure time, Parish enjoyed fly fishing for salmon and trout. Predeceased by his wife in 2009, Christopher Parish died on his 97th birthday in 2014. They had no children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005469
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hayata, Yoshihiro (1924 - 2012)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Harubumi Kato
Publication Date 2014-06-13 2014-10-17
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005400-E005499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377637377637
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Yoshihiro Hayata was a pioneer of lung cancer research and professor of surgery at Tokyo Medical University. He was born on 13 January 1924 in Hiroshima, Japan, and studied medicine at Tokyo Medical College, graduating in 1944. He spent much of his career in the department of surgery at Tokyo Medical College. He began as a surgeon in 1949, became an instructor in 1960, an associate professor in 1963 and professor in 1969. He was subsequently chief of the department and director of the cancer centre. In 1965, with Kingo Shinoi, Hayata performed the first living lung transplantation in Japan (and only the third in the world). Although during this period more people were affected by tuberculosis, bronchiectasis and lung abscesses in Japan, Hayata chose to focus on lung cancer. He helped establish lung cancer screening by sputum cytology and chest X-ray, and contributed to the development of the ﬁbreoptic and ﬂuorescence bronchoscopes, and bronchoscopic therapies such as YAG (Yttrium aluminium garnet) laser treatment and photodynamic therapy. These resulted in revolutionary progress in the diagnosis and treatment of lung cancer. In 1973 he established *in vitro* lung cancer cell lines and developed the canine lung cancer model. In the mid-1970s, he completed a study of the carcinogenetic process of lung squamous cell carcinoma with the Karolinska Institute. These findings were applied in many fields of oncology research around the world, including molecular biology and genomics, and aided researchers investigating sensitivity to drugs and the development of drugs. Hayata contributed to and served as president of many academic societies, including the Japan Society of Surgery (1989), the Japanese Association for Thoracic Surgery (1978), the Japanese Lung Cancer Society (1980), the Japanese Society of Clinical Cytology (1982, 1989) and the Japan Society for Laser Surgery and Medicine (1987). He was a founder and president of the International Photodynamic Association (in 1989) and president of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer from 1991 to 1994. He was a member of the USA/Japan Cooperative Cancer Research Program and lectured worldwide. He organised several major conferences, including the 9th World Conference of Lung Cancer (2000). Hayata loved mountain climbing and was involved in founding clinics in Nepal for the research and treatment of altitude sickness. In 1980s he established a foundation to provide medical education and training in his department for young Nepalese doctors. He was awarded an honorary fellowship from the Royal College of Surgeons in 1995. He also received the Japanese Legion of Honour and a decoration from the Kingdom of Nepal. Yoshihiro Hayata made a significant contribution not only to the education of medical students, but also to the development of medical science, particularly lung cancer. He died on 22 July 2012, aged 88.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005454
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Marks, Charles (1922 - 2015)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2016-05-16 2019-05-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009100-E009199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381331381331
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon Vascular surgeon
Details Charles Marks was professor of surgery at Louisiana State University, New Orleans. He was born in Kremenchug, Ukraine, the son of Abe Marks, a businessman, and Sonia Marks née Beck, a housewife. He migrated to South Africa, where he matriculated from Wynberg Boys’ High School in Cape Town in December 1939 with first class honours. He then studied medicine at the University of Cape Town, qualifying in 1945. He gained his FRCS in 1952. From 1953, he was a consultant surgeon in Salisbury, Rhodesia. In 1955, with two physicians, Michael Gelfand and Joseph Ritchken, he established the *Central Africa Medical Journal* and served on the editorial board until 1963, when he moved to the United States. He was an associate professor of surgery at the Medical College of Wisconsin, and then in 1967 he became an associate clinical professor of surgery at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and director of the department of surgery at Mount Sinai Hospital, Cleveland, Ohio. In 1971, he was appointed to his post at Louisiana State University School of Medicine. He was also chief of transplantation surgery at Charity and Hotel Dieu hospitals. In 1988, he returned Africa, to Zimbabwe, where he was a senior consultant in the Ministry of Health and director of the section of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery at Parirenyatwa Hospital, Harare. He was also chairman of the Zimbabwe Heart Foundation from 1989 to 1994. His last appointment was as medical executive director and director of medical education for the Florida Department of Corrections, a post he held from 1994 to 1998. At the Royal College of Surgeons, he was a Hunterian Professor in 1956 and gave a lecture on the surgical sequelae of bilharziasis. He wrote and edited several books on surgery, including *Applied surgical anatomy* (Springfield, Illinois, Charles C Thomas Publishers, 1972), *Surgical management of systemic hypertension* (Mount Kisco, New York, Futura Publishers, 1981), *Fundamentals of cardiac surgery* (London, Chapman and Hall Medical, 1993) and *Fundamentals of plastic surgery* (Philadelphia, W B Saunders, 1997). He also published a memoir *Threads of destiny: a surgeon’s odyssey* (Mustang, Oklahoma, Tate Publishing and Enterprises, LLC, 2007). He was an honorary member of the 1921 Surgical Club from 1983. In 1982, he received the Presidential Distinguished Medal of Merit from President Reagan. With his wife’s family, he established the Wernick-Marks endowment at the University of Zimbabwe Medical School for an annual lectureship. Outside medicine, he enjoyed boxing as a student and rugby, and was later interested in tennis, swimming, literature, golf and travelling. In December 1949, he married Joyce Wernick. They had four sons: Malcolm, a professor of plastic surgery in North Carolina; Peter, chief of cardio-thoracic surgery in Rockford, Illinois; Ian, a managing director; and Anthony, an investment and financial consultant. There are eight grandchildren and three great grandchildren. Charles Marks died on 10 May 2015. He was 93.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009148
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barnat, Ivan (1919 - 1985)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching James, Peter Ashman (1921 - 2013)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2013-11-08 2015-11-20
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004600-E004699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/376801376801
Occupation Radiologist Thoracic surgeon
Details Peter James was a consultant thoracic surgeon in Uganda and latterly a consultant radiologist at Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester. He was born on 19 September 1921 in Nailsea, north Somerset, the son of Walter Ashman, a chartered surveyor, and Hilda Ashman née Kitley, a nurse who had served at sea with the Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service during the First World War. He was educated at St Goar's School, Bristol, and at Bristol Grammar School, where he was a Peloquin scholar. He then studied medicine at Bristol University, gaining his MB ChB in 1943. He was a house surgeon to Arthur Rendle Short in Bristol and then, between 1944 and 1947, he was a captain in the RAMC, mainly with the 7th Indian Parachute Field Ambulance. After the war, he trained in Bristol, Gloucester and Newport as a general surgeon, and then at Morriston, Brompton and Great Ormond Street hospitals as a thoracic surgeon. From 1960 to 1967 he was a consultant thoracic surgeon in Uganda and an honorary lecturer at the University of East Africa. He was a member of the council of the Association of Surgeons of East Africa and president from 1965 to 1966. He was also a member of the Advisory Committee on Medical Education in East Africa in 1966. He was awarded an MBE in May 1963. In 1967 he left Uganda, re-trained in Canada and Bristol as a diagnostic radiologist, and was appointed as a consultant in radiology for the Manchester teaching area at Wythenshawe Chest Hospital and Manchester Chest Clinic. He wrote various papers on tuberculosis and medical education and contributed a chapter on thoracic surgery to *Companion to surgery in Africa, etc* (Edinburgh/London, E & S Livingstone, 1968). Outside medicine, he enjoyed sailing, bridge, driving, flying and competitive bowls. He died on 23 May 2013 in Southbourne, aged 91. He was survived by his widow Jean James (née Tregear), a former dermatologist, whom he had married in 1947.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004618
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Lynn, Ralph Beverley (1921 - 2009)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2019-12-18
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009600-E009699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/382926382926
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Ralph Beverly Lynn, known as ‘Bev’, was born on 24 August 1921 in Penetanguishene, Ontario, Canada. Having initially attended a local school, he moved to one in Midland, Ontario. He studied medicine at Queen’s University Medical School in Kingston, graduating top of his year in 1945. After house jobs at the Kingston General Hospital, he served briefly with the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps. He came to the UK and worked as a senior registrar in the pathology department at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in London. Following that, he undertook various posts in London and Edinburgh, passing the fellowship of the college in 1949 and of the Edinburgh college around that time. Moving to the USA, he spent time at Western Reserve University in Cleveland and Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore researching peripheral vascular disorders and the application of the heart-lung machine and investigating the incidence of hypothermia to patients undergoing surgical correction of cardiovascular disease. Eventually his old medical school decided to open a brand new cardiac catheterization and pulmonary laboratory and Bev was invited back to become head of cardiothoracic surgery. Inevitably, he took on an immense amount of administrative work plus the initial headache of setting up the heart-lung machine. Over the years he built up a reputation as an excellent clinical and operative cardiothoracic surgeon and was known for his cutting humour. A friend recalled his favourite aphorism - *statistics are used as a drunken man uses a lamp- post – not so much for the light it sheds on the problem as for the support it gives to his position*. He was an active member of the Canadian Thoracic society and its president from 1970 to 1971. He and his wife Blanche had four sons. They were both killed in a road traffic accident in Ontario on 1 December 2006. He was 85 years old.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009691
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Billimoria, Bomy Rustomjee (1916 - 1962)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Moore, Bryan Paul (1918 - 1997)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Ghosh, Dulal Chandra (1930 - 1995)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Lecutier, Edmond Rene (1918 - 1997)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Dark, John Fairman (1921 - 2009)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Raymond Hurt
Publication Date 2011-11-09 2012-11-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001500-E001599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373711373711
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details John Fairman Dark was a thoracic surgeon in Manchester. He was born in London on 18 April 1921, the son of Leonard Dark, a sales manager, and Dorothy Rose Dark née Fairman, a London Hospital nurse. He was educated at Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School, Blackburn, where he won Harrison and Kitchener scholarships, and then Manchester University Medical School. In 1944 he served for four and a half months in an Emergency Medical Service hospital at Conishead Priory. He gained his MB ChB in 1945. Following junior hospital posts at Manchester Royal Infirmary, in 1949 he began to train in his chosen specialty of thoracic surgery at Baguley Sanatorium, also in Manchester. In 1952 he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon at Baguely and at other hospitals in the region. Twenty years later, in 1972, he was appointed to the regional cardiothoracic unit at Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester. By the 1970s, pulmonary tuberculosis surgery had largely disappeared with the introduction of chemotherapy, and the major part of thoracic surgery was the treatment of bronchial carcinoma and, to a lesser extent, the treatment of oesophageal carcinoma. Dark always had a special interest in the treatment of oesophageal carcinoma, and he was very proud of the statistics that he and his team published in *Thorax* in 1981 for oesophageal resection for this disease ('Surgical treatment of carcinoma of the oesophagus' *Thorax* 1981 Dec;36[12]:891-5). Of the 449 operations they reported, there was a hospital mortality rate of only 7.6 per cent and a five year survival rate of 18 per cent above the average rate for that time. In 1968 Dark began open-heart surgery with the hypothermia technique at the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital. Then, like other thoracic surgeons of that era, he became more involved in closed heart surgery - mitral valvotomy and the treatment of congenital heart disease (patent ductus arteriosus and aortic coarctation). For six years he was an examiner for the Edinburgh cardiothoracic fellowship examination and, from 1980 to 1985, an adviser in cardiothoracic surgery to the Department of Health. He was president of the Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland, and president of the Manchester Medical Society in 1989. He had an extremely friendly personality and was greatly respected by his peers. He married Prudence Mary Holden in June 1949. They had four children - John Henry (a fellow of the College and professor of cardiothoracic and transplant surgery at Newcastle), Jeremy (who died infancy), Robert Fairman and Julia Mary. Dark developed a contained abdominal aortic aneurysm, which became a full rupture about 35 hours later and was not repaired because of a recent stroke. He died on 9 April 2009.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001528
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Grimshaw, Clement (1915 - 2005)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-09-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372445372445
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Clem Grimshaw was a thoracic surgeon in Oxford. He was born on 15 May 1915, in Batley, Yorkshire, to a wool family and was educated at Woodhouse Grove, the local Methodist school, where he learned to play the organ. A Latin master encouraged him to go to Edinburgh. On qualifying, he spent a year in general practice in Perth and, while waiting to go into the Army, he did a temporary post in the obstetrics department at Hope Hospital, Salford. There two surgeons died in the Blitz, and Clem was kept back for surgical duties, after which he passed the Edinburgh FRCS and then joined the RAMC in the Far East. After the war he returned to specialise in thoracic surgery with Andrew Logan and with Holmes Sellors at Harefield until he was appointed as a second consultant thoracic surgeon to the United Oxford Hospitals. At first he was dealing with pulmonary tuberculosis, but his practice gradually expanded into the surgery of lung cancer and the heart. He retired at 63 to spend time with his wife Hilde and four daughters. Much of his retirement was spent travelling in Scotland and Europe, reading widely, listening to music and playing golf. He died from congestive heart failure on 25 August 2005.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000258
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Rowlandson, Richard (1914 - 1990)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-07-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007600-E007699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379827379827
Occupation Chest surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Richard Rowlandson was born in India, the son of Edmund James who was serving in the Indian Police and a grandson of a judge in the Indian Civil Service. He was at school at Hurst Court in Hastings and later at Marlborough before starting his pre-clinical training at Clare College in Cambridge. At Guy's Hospital he continued his medical training where he qualified in 1939. He was much influenced by Sir Heneage Ogilvie and Lord Brock for whom he worked as a house surgeon before a registrar appointment with Hcdley Atkins. The war delayed his further training and he served in the Royal Navy as a Lieutenant Commander but after the successful FRCS examination in 1948 he developed his interest in chest surgery under Holmes Sellors at the London Chest hospital and Mr Ghey at Addenbrooke's in Cambridge. He was appointed consultant in chest surgery at the Brook Hospital and also had sessions at King Edward VII Hospital in Midhurst. Richard enjoyed skiing and summer mountaineering, and in 1948 he married Rosamund, the daughter of Dr Firth, a physician at King's College Hospital. They had a daughter and two sons, one of whom is at Guy's Hospital. He died on 15 September 1990.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007644
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bailey, John Stuart (1932 - 2016)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Ian Bailey
Publication Date 2017-03-16 2017-03-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009300-E009399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381499381499
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details John Stuart Bailey (or 'JCB') was a consultant cardiothoracic surgeon in Leicester. He was born in Jerusalem, Palestine, and spent his early years in Cairo, before being evacuated in 1940 to Durban and on to England. He was educated at Sherborne School, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and St Mary's Hospital Medical School. After house jobs, he started National Service and converted to a short service commission with the RAMC. He saw active service during the Brunei Revolt as a surgeon in a Far East field surgical team. On his return to the UK from Singapore, he worked as a general surgeon, before joining Charles Drew at St George's Hospital as a thoracic registrar. He subsequently spent 11 years as a registrar and then a senior registrar in thoracic and cardiac surgery at Westminster Hospital. During this time, he spent a year (from 1970 to 1971) at Toronto General Hospital working with W G Bigelow. Finding a consultant post in the mid 1970's was difficult and required resilience, JSB finally escaped London for Leicester in 1977. He enjoyed a happy and successful career until his retirement in 1995. JSB was part of a major transition generation in cardiac surgery. Beyond the early pioneers, he and his generation established safe and routine cardiac surgery. An early medical manager, he strove to understand the true costs of NHS care and pushed for honest, open and comprehensive reporting of outcomes. He was prepared to tackle controversy. On one occasion, he challenged coronary surgery in those who continued to smoke, provoking an aggressive public debate ('Coronary bypass surgery should not be offered to smokers' *BMJ* 1993 306 1047). He believed fervently in the NHS and social model of health care. He did not like the effect 'for profit' health care had on services and some surgeons. His beliefs and principles sometimes put him at loggerheads with parts of the surgical community. He reminded me, as a trainee general surgeon, when I was struggling with confidence after an unpleasant session with a trainer, not to become an egotistical, self-congratulatory surgeon. 'Remember' he said, '…it is the patients who are being brave!' He was president of the Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery in Great Britain and Ireland, and president of the Society of Clinical Perfusion Scientists, having helped the perfusionists establish a professional structure. JSB was made an honorary fellow of the Polish College of Surgeons in 1987. In 1992, he received further recognition for his work with Polish cardiac surgeons, with an award from the Bruckner Foundation. He and his wife had many happy visits to Poland and made many friends. Retirement did not create a void. He announced within weeks that he did not understand how he ever had time to go to work! Golf, genealogy, an amazing photographic record of butterfly life cycles, travel, community, friends and a growing extended family filled a healthy and happy retirement which lasted more than 20 years. John Stuart Bailey died suddenly, at home, on 18 September 2016, just short of his 83rd birthday. He was survived by his wife of 58 years, Alison, three children and 10 grandchildren. His ashes will be scattered in Kintyre, Argyll and Bute, his beloved holiday retreat of 44 years.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009316
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Semb, Carl ( - 1972)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Mair, Alexander Middleton (1911 - 1952)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-03-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005100-E005199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377314377314
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born on 1 October 1911 the only son of Alexander Mair, seed merchant, and Margaret Middleton his wife, he was educated at Turriff High School, Aberdeenshire and qualified from Aberdeen University in 1934. After serving as house surgeon at the Royal Infirmary, Oldham, and resident surgical officer at St Martin's Hospital, Bath and the Royal Infirmary, Blackburn, he was senior surgical registrar at the Royal Northern Infirmary, Inverness. During the war of 1939-45 he served in the RAF volunteer reserve, with the rank of Flying Officer. Mair became interested in thoracic surgery, served as senior surgical registrar at the Liverpool Chest surgical centre, Broadgreen Hospital, and was then appointed thoracic surgeon to the thoracic surgical unit at Castle Hill Hospital, Cottingham, Yorkshire. He lived at Audsley, Swanland, North Ferriby, where he died on 5 June 1952 aged 40, survived by his wife Dr Marjorie Dainton, whom he had married in 1941. There were no children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005131
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Mullard, Kenneth Stanley (1912 - 2002)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008800-E008899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380985380985
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Kenneth Mullard was born on 27 December 1912 in Enfield, Middlesex, where his father Stanley R Mullard MBE was founder and chairman of the Mullard Radio Valve Company. His mother was Emmie née Hole. He was educated at Lancing and Clare College, Cambridge, and went on to St Thomas's to do his clinical training. After qualification, he did house jobs at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, a casualty post at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, and was resident surgical officer in the EMS hospital at Weymouth. He entered the RAF in 1941 and rose to become a Squadron Leader and surgical specialist. After the war he specialised in thoracic surgery and trained under Sir Charles Max Page, Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors and Vernon Thompson. He published many papers on general thoracic surgery and oesophageal diseases. He married Phyllis Mary Smith in 1939. They had two sons, Bob and John. His hobbies were farming and flying. He died on 7 June 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008802
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching D'Souza, Edward Paul (1935 - 2010)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Tina Craig
Publication Date 2011-12-09 2014-03-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001700-E001799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373885373885
Occupation Cardiovascular surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Edward D'Souza was a thoracic and cardiovascular surgeon at Dakota Midland Hospital in the USA. He was born in Panjim, Goa on 19 July 1935 to Gerado Bruno D'Souza who worked in communications and his wife, Maria Orfelinda. He qualified MB,BS at the Seth Gordhandas Sunderdas Medical College, Parel, Bombay in 1961 after internship training at the KEM Hospital. In June that year he took up a 6 month surgical residency at Walsall Manor Hospital in the UK and followed this by posts throughout the country including Bolton, Sheffield, Scunthorpe, Altringham, Birmingham and Cornwall. Further experience was gained by a variety of locum jobs in London, St Albans and Northern Ireland. Before passing the College fellowship in 1969, he took various postgraduate courses at the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and Royal Postgraduate Medical School in London. Early in the 1970's he worked in London at the National Heart Hospital, Great Ormond Street and the Brompton Chest Hospital. Moving to the USA in late 1971 he was appointed fellow in cardiovascular surgery at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston, working with Denton R Cooley, the distinguished heart surgeon who founded the Institute in 1962. In 1973 he started the first cardiovascular unit in South Dakota at the Dakota Midland Hospital in Aberdeen and performed the first coronary by-pass surgeries in the state. He was a member of numerous local and international medical associations and a founder member of the Denton Cooley Cardiovascular Society. He married Heather Muriel on 9 July 1965 in Abadan, Iran. They had three children; David Joseph (born 20 March 1966) who became a software engineer for Microsoft, Sharon Megan Gburek (18 June 1967) and Dougal Nigel (5 July 1968). Both his younger children qualified MD from the University of Chicago and, at the time of his death, Sharon was in private practice in Scottsville, Arizona and Dougal was practising surgery in Chicago. In his youth D'Souza had been very athletic - in spite of suffering from undiscovered polio in childhood - enjoying soccer, grass hockey and running. Later interests were ballroom dancing, music and reading. He died, aged 75, on 7 September 2010 in Aberdeen, South Dakota.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001702
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Lichter, Ivan (1918- 2009)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Richard Bunton
Publication Date 2015-06-12 2018-01-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007400-E007499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379647379647
Occupation Thoracic surgeon Specialist in the care of the terminally ill
Details The recent death of Ivan Lichter ONZ has deprived New Zealand medicine of an extraordinary talent. Not only did Ivan have a very successful career as a thoracic surgeon but he went on to become a leading authority and visionary in the care of the terminally ill patient. Ivan was born in South Africa and graduated from the University of Witwatersrand (Johannesburg) in 1940. After spending some time in the South African armed forces, he specialised in thoracic surgery and built up a successful practice. He married Heather Lloyd in 1951 and they had four children: twins David and Jonathan who both practise medicine, Barry a journalist and Shelley who is also practising medicine. South African politics and a strong anti-semitic movement saw Ivan move his family to New Zealand in 1961. He told me that his choice was either to go to some place in Texas or to a place called Dune Din (!) in New Zealand. Thankfully he chose the latter, where he joined John Borrie. Between them they provided the thoracic surgical care for the lower half of the South Island. It was my pleasure to be Ivan’s registrar in the 1970’s as I was starting out in my training. Ivan was a meticulous surgeon. He bought a systematic and very disciplined approach to surgical issues. His pre-operative assessment always started with a thorough history and examination and then a careful review, in strict chronological order, of the radiology and other investigations. A complete picture was established which allowed the optimal planning for treatment. He also had a strong interest in research. He was the first in the world to use oesophageal motility studies in clinical medicine. He had modified a standard nasogastric tube to allow the recording of oesophageal pressures at three levels – five centimetres apart. It was not the most refined of devices and the motility studies became known as the ‘chunder studies’ – I suspect Ivan was unaware of this. His initial papers were not accepted for publication due to the reviewer's lack of understanding of oesophageal physiology. However, he was recognised by those that were to become world leaders in this field and they corresponded with Ivan on a regular basis. Ivan was a pioneer of overnight pH studies – this being done with a rather industrial pH probe which had to remain in the oesophagus overnight. However, the information gathered allowed him to take a rather more scientific approach to hiatus hernia surgery than was possibly the ‘norm’ in the 1970’s. He also took a keen interest in undergraduate education. He was an advocate of clear concise record keeping and he championed the same discipline that he bought to the operating room to this aspect of clinical medicine. The principle of SOAP – S(subjective), O(Objective), A(Assessment) and P (Plan) – was promoted by Ivan and the patients’ notes had pre-printed forms with these headings. He felt that this lead to a logical and more accurate approach to patient care. He participated in College activities and was, for a period of time, an examiner in cardiothoracic surgery. Ivan was fundamentally a shy person. It is also fair to reflect that he did not suffer fools lightly. Outwardly he did not display a great deal of emotion and for this reason Ivan was considered by some to be somewhat ‘cold’ and distant. Although those of us who worked closely with him knew differently, it came as a surprise to his colleagues when Ivan moved into the emotionally demanding field of caring for the terminally ill. He is considered by many to be the founding father of the modern hospice movement in New Zealand. This new direction for Ivan was really an extension of his philosophy that the needs of the patient were a clinician's prime concern. In the 1970’s he was holding multidisciplinary meetings regarding his patients which included all medical and allied health personnel involved in their care. They were held in the Chapel of Wakari Hospital and became known as the ‘prayer’ meetings, but they left a lasting impression on a surgical Trainee – probably more interested in cutting than cuddling at that stage – that what we do as surgeons in the operating room is only a small part of overall patient care, and that the non physical needs of the patient are as important as the physical needs, if not more so. Ivan retired from thoracic surgical practice in 1982. By this time his interest in palliative care was a passion. He had been influenced by Kubler-Ross’s work – particularly by her book “On Death and Dying”. He left Dunedin in 1986 and moved to Wellington to become director of Te Omanga Hospice where he remained until 1993. Ivan was awarded New Zealand’s highest honour, the Order of New Zealand (ONZ), in 1997 in recognition of his contribution to medicine and in particular for his promotion of the principle of holistic patient care. He also published widely in this field. The exodus of talented medical practitioners from South Africa has been of benefit to New Zealand for a number of years, and no more so than when Ivan Lichter decided to make his home here. Ivan’s contribution to New Zealand medicine has been immense. As a skilled thoracic surgeon he helped many patients and as a mentor he instilled sound surgical principles into his trainees. However, I suspect his greatest contribution came at a time when most surgeons would have chosen retirement. Ivan developed an interest that turned into a passion that saw him at the cutting edge of caring for the terminally ill patient. The benefits that have accrued as a result of this are immeasurable.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007464
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ahmadi, Mahmood (1936 - 2019)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Arthur Pomerantz
Publication Date 2019-12-18 2020-02-19
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009600-E009699
Occupation Thoracic surgeon General surgeon Vascular surgeon
Details Mahmood Ahmadi was a surgeon at the Veterans’ Affairs (VA) Hospital in West Palm Beach, Florida, USA. He was born into a privileged family in the small agricultural village of Vastan in Iran not far from Tehran. As an infant, he survived an earthquake to which many of his siblings succumbed. Growing up he enjoyed a multicultural upbringing and was exposed to many different customs and beliefs, from Kurdish bareback riding to the Judaic roots of Purim in Persia. Like his older brother, Abdol Ghana Ahmadi, a noted lawyer and jurist in Iran, Mahmood possessed a superior intellect. He combined this with a familial motivation to master his scholarly pursuits in all disciplines, not just science and medicine. Mahmood developed his addiction to surgery at the Tehran University of Medical Sciences and received his MD in 1960. He pursued two years of missionary work in rural Iran, followed by a rotating internship and residency in Canton, Ohio, USA at the Aultman Hospital and then a general surgery residency in Cleveland, Ohio at Fairview Park Hospital and Mount Sinai Hospital under the Case Western University system. His chief of surgery there, Charles Marks, recommended that he seek further training at the Royal College of Surgeons in England. After completing a paper with Marks in 1969 (‘Agnogenic myeloid metaplasia: role of splenectomy’ *Postgrad Med J*. 1969 Apr;45[522]:261-5), Ahmadi crossed the pond to London to immerse himself in his studies with a clinical appointment at King Edward Memorial Hospital, riding around town in a red Triumph convertible. His rewards for his efforts were the fellowship on 7 July 1971, when he passed his exams, and, more importantly, Marsha Savage of Centreville, New Brunswick, Canada, whom he married on 22 August 1970. After gaining his FRCS, Ahmadi went back to his native country in 1972, to work as a general surgeon in Qom. His thirst for mastery of advanced surgical techniques took him and his family back to Cleveland, Ohio from 1974 to 1976, where he received cardiothoracic residency training at St Vincent Charity Medical Center. He again returned to his homeland to practise his newly-honed skills in Tabriz and then Tehran. He subsequently rose steadily in clinical reputation to university faculty representative to the Shah in his specialty. Throughout his rise to professional eminence in his home country he always expressed a desire ‘to do my best to help the people’. He did this financially, spiritually and medically. Unfortunately, he had to survive another earthquake in the form of the Iranian Revolution at the end of 1978. Marsha and their daughters took the last Pan Am flight out of Tehran on the day after Christmas. Mahmood made it out on Easter weekend of 1979 after tending to casualties of both sides of the hostilities. They were united at the Savage family homestead in New Brunswick, Canada. Mahmood had the equivalent of $47 in his pocket. Always looking forward, he took a fellowship at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston under Denton Cooley from July 1979, and then worked as a general, thoracic and vascular surgeon at the Aroostook Medical Center (AMC) in Presque Isle, Maine, the town across the border from Centreville. After nine years as a mostly-solo practitioner with a splendid reputation for excellence in surgical care, Mahmood joined the four-man group of surgeons assembled by David Sensenig. For six more years, this surgical programme was fully funded under the auspices of US Senator George Mitchell of Maine, at the VA Hospital at Togus, Maine, where I first met him. We had a challenging and interesting practice covering the full scope of surgery except open heart surgery. After Senator Mitchell retired, the Togus inpatient programme was cut back and Mahmood and I were reassigned as part of the start-up crew for the newest VA Hospital in West Palm Beach, Florida in 1995. For five more clinical years at the VA, Mahmood became the go-to guy when patients presented for complex surgical intervention. He also returned to Iran on short sabbaticals to practise open heart surgery at a university hospital in Tehran and was appointed to the Iranian Board of Cardiothoracic Surgery. Ahmadi retired from the VA and clinical practice in 1999 mostly because of concerns about the hospital’s inefficient IT revolution. We remained close friends for another 20 years. I remember driving him to Hollywood, Florida, where I worked as a surgical oncologist so that he could observe his true passion, cardiac surgery, after a good breakfast in the physicians’ cafeteria. He eventually befriended every member of that department headed then by Michael Rosenbloom. He called them his cousins. Throughout his life, he maintained an interest in comparative religious philosophy, liturgy and history. He was a self-proclaimed Deist, Sufi and follower of the poet Rumi for most of his life, but accepted the sacraments of the Catholic faith just before his death. He befriended many clergy of nearly all denominations as his cousins as long as they shared his inherent honesty and concern for individuals. Many of us counted on his fatherly support as well as biblical knowledge to help us through difficult times. He honoured me, a colleague and friend for his last 30 years, by presiding during the funeral of my eldest son. As a young man, Ahmadi was an active and accomplished intercollegiate athlete, competing throughout the Middle East and Europe, as a champion weightlifter. He developed immensely appealing social skills, which, with his handsome countenance, muscular appearance and vitality, earned him a thick address book, of which he was proud. He was certainly not shy with the opposite sex. He was a polyglot by inclination and personal experience. Ahmadi passed away on 19 November 2019 at his home in Jupiter, Florida from a brief illness arising from acute myeloid leukaemia. He was 82. He was survived by his widow Marsha, three daughters, six grandchildren and dozens of devoted friends and colleagues. Ahmadi was truly a citizen of and surgeon to the world: all of his cousins like me really miss him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009674
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brain, Robert Henry Field (1914 - 1993)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-09-02 2018-03-05
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007800-E007899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380021380021
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Robert Brain studied medicine at Birmingham University and trained at the Middlesex and St Bartholomew's Hospitals. He became a Fellow of the College in 1940. He had early house appointments at the General and Queen Elizabeth Hospitals in Birmingham. During the second world war he served as a surgical specialist with the RAMC. Moving to London he became thoracic surgeon to Guy's and the King Edward VII Hospital in London. He was also thoracic surgeon to the South East Metropolitan Regional Health Board. A member of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain, he was also a member of the Association of Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain. He published several articles on the management of hernias and oesophageal strictures. It is not known when he died. [Date of death confirmed as 15 October 1993. Ancestry.co.uk 23 February 2018.]
Resource Identifier RCS: E007838
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Thompson, Heath Thurlow (1920 - 2003)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Probert, William Routledge (1919 - 1962)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-04-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005200-E005299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377473377473
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born in 1919 at Mountain Ash, Glamorgan, he was educated at Repton, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge and the Middlesex Hospital. After qualification he served as a Captain and graded surgeon in the RAMC. Later he was resident medical officer at Tindal House Emergency Hospital in Aylesbury and St Andrew's Hospital, Dollis Hill. In 1953 he became a senior house officer at Sully Hospital in Penarth, Glamorgan and in 1957 obtained an Anglo-French Exchange Bursary under the Ciba Foundation. At the time of his death, he held the appointment of senior registrar in thoracic surgery at Sully Hospital, although the last six years of his life were clouded by an incurable illness, which he bore with great gallantry and fortitude. He died on 21 June 1962 aged 43, survived by his widow and two sons. Publications: Cholangiography in hepatic hydatid disease. *Brit J Surg* 1955, 43, 308. Sudden operative death due to massive tumour embolism. *Brit J Surg* 1956, 1, 435. Coarctation of aorta complicated by aneurysm treated by resection. *Proc Roy Soc Med* 1956, 49, 729.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005290
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Evans, Cyril John (1915 - 1986)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-13 2016-02-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007200-E007299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379445379445
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Cyril John Evans was born in Llandysul, Cardiganshire on 12 June 1915, the son of William, the postmaster, and Letitia (Morgan). He was educated at University College, Cardiff and University College Hospital, London, qualifying MRCS LRCP in 1938 and graduating MB BS London 1939. He trained in surgery in the Emergency Medical Service in Blackburn, Manchester, Cardiff, London, Reading and Newcastle-upon-Tyne and passed the final FRCS examination in 1946. He entered thoracic surgery, working under Thomas Holmes Sellors and Vernon Thompson in London and under George Mason at Shotley Bridge. In 1952 he was appointed thoracic surgeon to the South Wales Hospital Authority and established the cardiothoracic unit at the Morriston Hospital, Swansea, being there until he retired in 1983. He was a member of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. His great interests were in music and radio equipment. In 1949 he married Nancy J Parnaby a radiographer and they had four sons. His wife survived him when he died on 22 February 1986.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007262
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Gordon, Walter (1916 - 2003)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2010-09-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001000-E001099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373209373209
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Walter Gordon was a thoracic surgeon. He was born on 11 January 1916 in Modderfontein, South Africa, the third child and second son of Herman Gordon, a confectionery manufacturer and businessman, and Anna née Rabinowitz , a housewife. He was educated at King Edward VII School, Johannesburg, and then at the University of Witwatersrand, where he studied medicine, qualifying in 1939. He then served as a captain in the South African Medical Corps during the Second World War. Following his demobilisation, he travelled to the UK, where he was a senior registrar in the regional thoracic unit in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and then a first assistant in thoracic surgery at St George’s Hospital, London. He subsequently emigrated to the United States, where he was a surgeon at the Veterans Administration Hospital and associate professor of clinical surgery at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, City University, New York. He was a member of the executive committee of the Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery in Great Britain and Ireland. In the United States he was a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists and was certified as a specialist by the American Board of Anesthesiology. He wrote on thoracic surgery, particularly on haematoma, tuberculosis and carcinoma of the oesophagus and lung. He married Stella Beryl Girdy in 1943. They had three children – Heryl, a teacher, Nayvin, a medical practitioner, and Shale, a cardiologist. He enjoyed playing chess, skiing, tennis and swimming. He died on 10 February 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001026
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Smith, Roger Abbey (1916 - 2016)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Paddy Matthews
Publication Date 2017-03-16 2017-03-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009300-E009399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381508381508
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Roger Abbey Smith was a consultant surgeon at Walsgrave Hospital, Coventry. He was born in Birkenhead. At the age of 11 he was deeply affected by the early death of his mother from psittacosis pneumonia caught from the family parrot, despite being attended by Henry Cohen, arguably the most celebrated physician of the 20th century. His father never remarried and, having three brothers, Roger was brought up in an entirely male household. He attended Birkenhead School, and went on to study medicine at Liverpool School of Medicine, winning the A C Rich prize in medicine and the gold medal for obstetrics and gynaecology. His mother's death set him on course for a medical career, with a focus on pulmonary disease. He qualified in 1940 and, after becoming a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1943, enlisted in the RAMC. He saw active service first on D-day aboard the hospital ship *Batavia* and then in Burma. He was subsequently posted to the Augusta Victoria Hospital - a 1,200 bed hospital - in Jerusalem, which had been requisitioned as the 16th British General Hospital. This was where his interest in thoracic surgery began under George Qvist, later consultant surgeon to the Royal Free Hospital, and Lloyd Rusby, later chest physician at the London Hospital. After demobilisation and a spell at St Wulstan's Hospital, Malvern, a large TB sanatorium, he left for a year in Sri Lanka under the Colombo Plan, sailing there and back with his wife Teddie and three children. On his return in 1953, he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon to the Birmingham Regional Hospital Board, based at the King Edward VII Memorial Sanatorium at Hertford Hill, near Warwick. In the late 1960's, the chest unit moved to the new Walsgrave Hospital in Coventry, where Roger remained for the rest of his professional career, holding satellite clinics in Worcester (with Stan Kalinowski) and at Burton upon Trent. Over time his principal clinical interests were TB, oesophageal and lung cancer surgery. Roger was the editor of *Thorax* from 1970 to 1976, and co-editor with R E Smith of *Surgery of the oesophagus: the Coventry Conference: proceedings of a conference held at the Postgraduate Medical Centre, Coventry, on 14th and 15th July, 1971* (London, Butterworths) in 1972. With J Leigh Collis and D B Clarke, he co-edited the 4th edition of *d'Abreu's practice of cardiothoracic surgery* (London, Edward Arnold) in 1976. During his career, he wrote over 25 articles in eight different journals, and contributed to five international textbooks. In 1974, he was elected president of the Thoracic Society, and in 1976 president of the Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery. From 1975 to 1979 he was an adviser in cardiothoracic surgery to the Department of Health under the chief medical officer, Sir Henry Yellowlees. Roger travelled, operated and lectured abroad, mainly in Spain, the Benelux countries and America, including the Mayo Clinic, and the Massachusetts General Hospital. He was an honorary member of many international thoracic associations. Roger took a keen interest in the careers of his junior staff, but, I am told, terrified the theatre staff, demanding nothing but the very highest standards. He retired in 1979 to rural Herefordshire. He was an enthusiastic gardener, a keen ornithologist - particularly knowledgeable on birds of prey - and enjoyed salmon fishing and shooting. He holidayed every year with his family in the hills above Harlech in north Wales, the childhood home of his mother. He died peacefully on 24 July 2016, having lived in his own home until the last fortnight of his life, three weeks short of his 100th birthday. He was survived by Teddie, his wife of 73 years, his four children, 12 grandchildren and 13 great grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009325
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hooton, Norman Stanwell (1921 - 2004)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-28 2012-03-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372262372262
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Norman Stanwell Hooton was a consultant thoracic surgeon in the south east Thames region. He was born in Warwick on 8 November 1921, the only child of Leonard Stanwell Hooton, a land commissioner, and Marion Shaw Brown née Sanderson. He was educated at Oundle School and then went on to Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and King's College Hospital, where he won the Jelf medal in 1944 and the Legg prize in surgery in 1949. He was house physician to Terence East at the Horton Emergency Medical Service Hospital, Epsom, in 1945, and subsequently a registrar in the thoracic surgical unit. In 1950 he was a resident surgical officer at the Dreadnought Seaman's Hospital and from 1951 to 1955 a senior surgical registrar at Brook Hospital in south London. He was subsequently appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon to the South East Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board, working at Brook Hospital, Grove Park Hospital, at Hastings, and at Kent and Sussex Hospital, Tunbridge Wells. He married Katherine Frances Mary née Pendered, the daughter of J H Pendered, a Fellow of the College, in 1951. They had two sons and five grandchildren. Norman Hooton died on 6 September 2004 after a long illness.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000075
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sheikh, Hyder Ismail (1931 - 1971)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Adeney, Noel Frederick (1897 - 1999)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008400-E008499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380621380621
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Noel Adeney, known as 'Jeff', was born in Cairo on 26 November 1897. His father, Frederick Field Adeney, was a priest, his mother was Rosalie, neé Savage. He was educated at Monkton Combe School and then St John's College, Cambridge, on an open classical scholarship. He served in the first world war, in the Royal Field Artillery, between 1916 and 1918. He won a university entrance scholarship to St Mary's Hospital Medical School, where he graduated in 1923. He was a house surgeon at St Mary's, then a surgical clinical assistant at the Brompton Hospital, where he was influenced in his training by J E A Roberts and by Tudor Edwards. He was then appointed surgeon to Bournemouth and East Dorset hospitals and also held the appointment of thoracic surgeon to the South West Metropolitan Regional Hospital Board. He later became a member of the same board and Chairman of the local division of the British Medical Association. He married Bettie Wardle in 1925 and they had one son, Robin, and one daughter, Mary. He died on 9 July 1999.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008438
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Matthews, Hugoe Redvers ( - 2011)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Richard S Steyn
Publication Date 2011-09-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E001000-E001999/E001400-E001499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/373619373619
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Hugoe Matthews was an eminent thoracic surgeon who was an expert on the diseases of the oesophagus; he was also an authority on the Victorian nature writer and mystic Richard Jefferies. He was educated at Sutton County Grammar School where, even as a teenager, he knew he wanted to be a surgeon. He qualified in medicine and surgery at University College London (despite pronouncing a 55-year-old woman pregnant in his practical exams). After a number of jobs in London, he moved to Bristol in 1968 as a registrar in cardiothoracic surgery. Then, following a spell as a senior registrar in Liverpool, he became a consultant at East Birmingham Hospital in 1976. During his career as a consultant at East Birmingham (now Birmingham Heartlands) Hospital, 'HRM' (as he was fondly known by his juniors and staff) developed several new techniques to improve treatment of a range of problems of the chest and oesophagus. In the field of thoracic surgery, he developed what has become known as the 'minitrach' (short for mini-tracheostomy) - a small plastic tube placed in the windpipe during chest surgery through which the lungs can be cleared with a suction device. The minitrach has been used on the battlefield as an emergency breathing aid - saving the lives of soldiers in Afghanistan and other war zones. His own interests focused on diseases of the oesophagus. He established a laboratory for oesophageal disorders (which became a referral centre for the whole of the West Midlands). He had great success in reducing death rates among people with oesophagal cancer by giving chemotherapy before their operations - an unusual move at the time. He set up a programme encouraging overseas fellows to spend time in Birmingham being exposed to oesophageal practice. In 1984 he set up the Oesophagal Cancer Research Appeal to raise money for a laboratory which was opened in 1989. This research programme supported several higher degrees and generated a steady output of research papers. His research and clinical registrars all remember his tutelage fondly and will never forget his logical approach to surgical thinking and practice, and an unerring ability to know when a trainee was unsure of their ground no matter how confidently they presented themselves. He was instrumental in establishing the British Oesophageal Group (which still adheres to many of the principles he espoused) and worked closely with a former patient to establish an Oesophagal Patients' Association in 1985 which is now a well-established national charity with many local associations supporting patients throughout Britain. In the early 1990s he developed links with the department of biological sciences at Warwick University, with the result that he was created an honorary professor of thoracic surgery. His work at Warwick helped to lay the foundations for a flourishing postgraduate medical school. He published many papers and was editor of the professional journal *Thorax*. He lectured around the world and served as vice-president of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons from 1993, and as president in 1995. He performed one of the first surveys of cardiothoracic consultant staff nationally trying to predict retirements and vacancies to more formally establish workforce planning and trainee numbers. At Birmingham he and a colleague set up an Escapists' Dinner Club for consultants where medical talk was banned and guests discussed their hobbies instead. His own hobby was Richard Jefferies, a contemporary of Thomas Hardy, known for his semi-mystical writing about nature and the countryside. He had stumbled across Jefferies by chance, thinking that his *The gamekeeper at home* might be a sequel to *Lady Chatterley's lover*. He read every known work published by Jefferies (and much unpublished work in his notebooks and letters), gaining a clear insight into the development of his writing and the evolution of his thoughts and ideas. He served as president of the Richard Jefferies Society and in 1993, with George Miller, published a thorough and authoritative bibliography of Jefferies's work. He followed this with *The forward life of Richard Jefferies: a chronological study* (Oxford, Pelton, 1994, written with Phyllis Treitel). He also produced a new index and anthology of Jefferies's works with the assistance of Rebecca Welshman. A contemplative man who enjoyed a pipe and listening to jazz, Matthews devoted himself to books and, after his retirement in the mid-1990s, developed his skills as an artist. He exhibited his pictures at shows held by the Tiverton Arts Society, of which he was a member. In 1968 he married Judy Thain, who survived him with their son and daughter. Hugoe Matthews died on 10 March 2011.
Resource Identifier RCS: E001436
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Golebiowski, Adam (1914 - 1998)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Samaan, Hakim Abdel Malak (1929 - 1984)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-07-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007600-E007699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379824379824
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born in 1929, Hakim Abdel Malak Samaan studied medicine in London, qualifying MB, BS from Guy's Hospital in 1958. He became surgical registrar in the thoracic unit of the Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh and passed the FRCS Ed in 1962. Moving to London he held appointments at the Prince of Wales' Hospital, the London Chest Hospital and the Bedford General Hospital and became a Fellow of the College in 1964. In the late 1970s he moved to Houston, Texas, and became a lecturer at the Hermann Hospital. He also practised at the Memorial Hospital and the Houston North West Medical Center. He was a member of the Southern Thoracic Surgical Association, the Society for Thoracic Surgery and the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. He died on 16 December 1984.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007641
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Paul, Arthur Terence Sahanandan (1915 - 2008)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by John Blandy
Publication Date 2012-02-17 2014-03-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002000-E002099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374222374222
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Arthur Terence Sahanandan ('A T S') Paul was a pioneering cardiothoracic surgeon in Sri Lanka. He was born on 5 September 1915 in Colombo, in what was then Ceylon, into a distinguished Tamil family. His father, Samuel Chelliah Paul, was a senior surgeon at the General Hospital, Colombo, and the first Sri Lankan to obtain the FRCS England in 1901 by examination. His mother was Dora Eleanor née Asarappa. Both his paternal and maternal grandfathers were doctors, and A T S' elder brother, Milroy Paul, was the first professor of surgery at the University of Ceylon in Colombo. A T S was educated at the Royal College, Colombo, and then went on to University College Colombo and Ceylon Medical College. He graduated in 1940 with first class honours and three distinctions. In the same year he won a prize for a drawing of Rabindranath Tagore, built both a boat and a model aeroplane, and captained the cricket team in which he was the star bowler. From 1941 to 1946, he was a captain in the Ceylon Medical Corps, attached to the 132 Command General Hospital and then to the Ceylon Light Infantry at China Bay Trincomalee. He was a demonstrator in anatomy at the University of Colombo in 1946. He then went to London, to King's College Hospital Medical School, where he worked under Sir Cecil Wakeley and E G Muir, and then the Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith. In 1966 he was trained by Charles A Hufnagel at Georgetown University, USA, in cardio-pulmonary bypass techniques used in open heart surgery. In 1950, he was appointed as a surgeon to the thoracic unit, General Hospital in Colombo, the first such unit established in Ceylon, retiring in 1975. When he began work at the General Hospital there was a high incidence of tuberculosis and rheumatic heart disease, and over the course of his career he saw a remarkable development in the specialty. For many years the Colombo unit was the only cardiothoracic unit on the island, so he organised annual visits to the north, taking his entire nursing and surgical team with him. He also trained several generations of cardiothoracic surgeons, who eventually set up new units throughout Sri Lanka. From 1975 to 1980, he was a senior lecturer at the University of Nairobi, Kenya, and a consultant surgeon at Kenyatta National Hospital, setting up the first cardiac surgery unit in Nairobi. He was Hunterian professor of our college in 1966. Among his many publications, he wrote a self-published autobiography, *My trek to the heart: a cardiac surgeon's story of adventure and endeavour between 1920 and 1980* (Colombo, 2002). He continued to be involved in sport, playing cricket into his ninth decade, and becoming a member of motor yacht and power boat clubs. He painted in pastels and oils, and created model aircraft. In 1946 he married Marie Baptista, whom he had met while she was serving in the Indian Army Nursing Service at Trincomalee. His son, Surendramohan Chandpal Paul is a surgeon at Hinchingbrooke Hospital, Huntingdon. A T S Paul died on 28 April 2008 in the National Hospital, Sri Lanka, formerly the General Hospital, following a short illness.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002039
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Robinson, Clayton Lindsay Nelson (1919 - 2011)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Richard Robinson
Publication Date 2012-06-28 2012-09-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002500-E002599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/374736374736
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Clayton Lindsay Nelson Robinson, known as 'Robbie', was a thoracic surgeon in Vancouver, Canada. He was born in Chapeau, Quebec, the son of Joseph Edward Robinson, a rancher, and Ada Elizabeth Robinson née Armstrong. He was raised on a farm in Meath, Ontario, the youngest of three sons who were all destined to become doctors. Educated in the Ottawa Valley towns of Pembroke and Renfrew, he graduated early from Queen's Medical School in 1943 and volunteered for the Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserve. He served on the HMCS *Middlesex* in the Atlantic convoy escort as a surgeon lieutenant until the end of the Second World War, when he joined the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy and travelled to Ceylon for three months. He was very proud of his time in the Navy, and loved telling stories about his time on the high seas. After the war, Clayton demonstrated anatomy at the University of Toronto under J C B Grant (he wrote Grant's biography in 1993 for the Canadian Medical Association). His medical training in thoracic surgery continued in Vancouver and England, and he met his wife Kathleen Feenan at Southend-on-Sea Hospital. They were married on St Patrick's Day 1952 and honeymooned in Ireland, where Clayton kissed the Blarney Stone. Clayton and Kathleen lived in Saskatoon from 1958 to 1966, where he was a member of the department of surgery and worked at University Hospital. He was president of both the Canadian Thoracic Association and Saskatoon Medical Association in 1965. The family moved to Vancouver in 1966 and Clayton worked primarily at Vancouver General, Shaughnessy and St Vincent's hospitals and as a professor of surgery at the University of British Columbia. His work was his passion, and he was much loved by his patients and hospital staff. His crowning glory came in 1982 when he was invited to give a Hunterian Lecture at the Royal College of Surgeons in London. The topic of his lecture was 'The role of surgery of the thymus for myasthenia gravis'. He was extremely honoured and proud of this invitation. In 1985, Clayton turned 65 and, along with 14 other physicians, lost his privileges at Vancouver General Hospital. They challenged this newly-created hospital by-law on the grounds that it infringed the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms on the basis of age discrimination. This precedent-setting case was eventually heard in the Supreme Court of Canada in 1990 and became the basis for many of the mandatory retirement policies of today. Clayton also loved the sea and the mountains, and he built two sailing dinghies and a family cabin at Whistler, where family and friends shared many happy times. Although Kathleen was the social planner, Clayton loved making Irish coffees to 'splice the mainbrace'. He was an avid reader, frustrated gardener and regular attendee at the Vancouver Symphony, Vancouver Opera, and Vancouver Men's Welsh Choir. Clayton passed away in his home on 13 November 2011 at the age of 92. Predeceased by his wife Kathleen in 2009, he was survived by his children Moya, Elspeth and Richard, and his five grandchildren, Lucy, Anna, Tessa, Andrew and James.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002553
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ebert, Paul Allen (1932 - 2009)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Denton A Cooley
Publication Date 2014-02-24 2014-03-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005000-E005099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377206377206
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Paul Allen Ebert was an American thoracic and cardiovascular surgeon. He is best known for his contributions to the repair of complex cardiac anomalies in infants and for his directorship of the American College of Surgeons. He is also remembered as a researcher, educator and athlete. Paul Ebert was born in Columbus, Ohio, on 11 August 1932. He attended Ohio State University in Columbus, where he became a widely recognised student athlete, excelling at both baseball and basketball. He was recruited to play professional baseball for the New York Giants and Pittsburgh Pirates, but declined their offers in order to pursue a medical career. After earning his medical degree from Ohio State University in 1958, Ebert completed his surgery internship and residency at Johns Hopkins Hospital under the direction of Alfred Blalock. Ebert spent two years as a senior assistant surgeon at the National Heart Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, and then went on to become a professor of surgery at Duke University Medical Center. Later he served as chairman of the department of surgery at Cornell University Medical College (from 1971 to 1975) in New York City and then as chairman of the department of surgery at the University of California San Francisco Medical Center (UCSF) (from 1975 to 1986). While at UCSF, he contributed many advances to the field of cardiovascular surgery, specifically pertaining to the primary surgical repair of complex cardiac anomalies in infants. In particular, he introduced clinical methods that greatly enhanced the survival of patients with truncus arteriosus and that enabled neonates with transposition of the great arteries to undergo the arterial switch operation. In 1986, Ebert left clinical practice to become executive director of the American College of Surgeons (ACS), headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. With him at the helm, the ACS expanded its member services, established an extensive managed-care educational programme, and maintained a strong lobby in Congress on behalf of patient choice. He also organised the construction of a new building to serve as a permanent home for the college. This building also houses the administrative offices of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, the Society for Vascular Surgery, the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma, and other professional organisations. Ebert was a member of many surgical societies and served as president of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery, the Society of University Surgeons and the Western Thoracic Surgical Association, among others. He was also a member of the Johns Hopkins Society of Scholars and was vice chair of the American Board of Thoracic Surgery (from 1987 to 1989). He wrote or co-authored 198 peer-reviewed scientific articles. He was also a popular and gifted surgical educator. In retirement, Ebert enjoyed golfing with the Senior Cardiovascular Surgical Society, a small group of surgical educators from major US medical institutions who met to play golf and exchange surgical experiences. In 1989, he received the Theodore Roosevelt award, the National Collegiate Athletic Association's highest honour, which is given to varsity athletes who have achieved high recognition in their adult lives. On 20 April 2009, Paul Ebert died of a heart attack sustained while playing golf. He was 76. He was survived by Louise Joyce (née Parks), his wife of 55 years, and by their three children (Leslie, Mike and Julie) and five grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005023
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Channell, Gerald Dalton (1911 - 1950)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-06-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005500-E005599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377770377770
Occupation Anatomist Thoracic surgeon
Details Born in Natal in 1911 and educated at Guy's Hospital, where he won the Hilton Dissection Prize in 1933 and qualified through London University and the Conjoint Board in 1936. After serving as house surgeon and junior demonstrator of anatomy at Guy's, he was appointed University Demonstrator of Anatomy at Cambridge in 1938. During the second world war he served as a Surgeon Lieutenant-Commander in the Royal Navy, and published a paper on the immersion foot syndrome. He returned to Guy's as assistant lecturer in anatomy, working on the lumbrical and interosseous muscles. He became interested in congenital deformities of the heart and decided to transfer from anatomy to thoracic surgery. He passed the Fellowship in 1949, and was appointed a Registrar at Brompton Hospital. While pursuing his own research there, he was killed in an accidental explosion on 27 May 1950, aged 38, survived by his wife and child. Publications: Immersion foot syndrome, with C C Ungley and R L Richards. *Brit J Surg* 1945, 33, 17-31. The action of the lumbrical and interosseous muscles in some of the movements of the digits, with J Whillis. *J Anat* 1949, 83, Proceedings p 50. The effect of ulnar nerve block at the level of the pisiform bone on movements of the ring finger, with the same. As the foregoing, p 71.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005587
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Chin, Ernest Favenc (1913 - 1959)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-02-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004900-E004999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377136377136
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born in Sydney in 1913 of Latvian descent, he distinguished himself as an athlete, playing Rugby football for Australia and swimming in the Sydney Life-savers Club. Qualifying in 1940 he served for five years in the Royal Australian Naval Medical Service, working for a time in the North Sea convoys between Britain and Russia. After the war he settled in England and specialised in thoracic surgery. He was attached to the thoracic unit at Harefield under T Holmes Sellors and then became thoracic surgeon to Preston Hall, Aylesford, the King George V Sanatorium, Guildford, and Colindale Hospital. He moved to Southampton in 1951 on appointment as Director of Thoracic Surgery for the Wessex Region, and joined the staff of the Southampton, Portsmouth, and Ventnor Hospitals. He was a Hunterian Professor at the College in 1956, lecturing on "The surgery of funnel chest and pigeon chest", and also wrote on the surgery of the heart and the oesophagus. "Paul" Chin, as he was generally known, married in 1942 Margaret Josephine Weddall who survived him with their three sons. He was killed on 5 December 1959 when driving his sports car near his home at Yew Tree Cottage, Nether Wallop, Hampshire, when it skidded on an icy road and turned over. A memorial service was held in the Methodist Church at Shirley, Southampton. He had supreme self-confidence and physical stamina, but was without worldly ambition, an industrious and self-sacrificing team-worker.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004953
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brunow, Harry Louis (1918 - 1954)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-02-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004900-E004999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377110377110
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Born in South Africa on 1 August 1918, youngest son of Hyman Brunow, merchant, and his wife, née Maister, he was educated at South African College School, Cape, and the University of Cape Town. After serving as house surgeon at Groote Schuur Hospital, he went on active service with the South African Medical Corps in the Middle East and Italy during the war of 1939-45. Towards the end of the war he served at Wynberg Military Hospital, Cape. He came to England in 1946 and was appointed a clinical assistant in the genito-urinary department at Guy's Hospital. He served as demonstrator of anatomy, was appointed an additional surgical registrar on the senior surgeon's firm, and took the Fellowship in 1949. He then spent two and a half years as surgical registrar at Lewisham Hospital. Determining to specialise in thoracic surgery, he worked at the Brompton Hospital under Sir Russell Brock and Oswald Tubbs. He was appointed to the Brook Hospital, but developed leukaemia and died after several months' illness on 20 November 1954 aged 36. He was not married. Brunow was Captain of the Guy's Rugby Football Club in 1947, when his XV won the Hospitals Cup for the first time in fourteen years. He also played cricket, squash rackets, lawn tennis, and golf. He had great vitality, energy and ability, which should have taken him to success. He was widely popular and a keen amateur of music.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004927
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Milne, Douglas Mearns (1916 - 1982)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Buckley, William (1903 - 1956)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-02-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004900-E004999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377115377115
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born at Oldham 7 October 1903, son of Llewellyn Buckley, yarn broker, and Sarah Henthorne his wife, he was educated at King Edward VII School, Lytham St Anne's, at St John's College, Cambridge and at St Bartholomew's Hospital. He was house surgeon to Sir Geoffrey Keynes and Harold Wilson at Bart's and then went into general practice at Worksop, Nottinghamshire, where he lived at Westbourne House, Newcastle Street, and served on the staff of the Victoria Hospital. He gave up general practice in 1944 when he was appointed to the surgical staff of Stoke Mandeville Hospital under Professor T Pomfret Kilner, and in 1945 joined George Mason's thoracic surgical unit at Shotley Bridge. He was appointed in 1946 assistant thoracic surgeon to the City Hospital, Nottingham and became consultant in charge of the unit in 1948. This thoracic unit had been started in 1939 by Laurence O'Shaugnessy FRCS, who was killed early in the war of 1939-45. Buckley developed it into a regional centre of thoracic and cardiac surgery. He was also associate surgeon to the Nottingham General Hospital and held other appointments at Grimsby, Worksop, and Lincoln, and at Newstead and Ransom sanatoria. He travelled in Europe and America to study the development of surgery of the heart. Buckley married on 6 June 1931 Nancy Stott of Lytham-St Anne's. He suffered a heart attack in 1955, and died suddenly from a second attack, while holding an out-patient clinic, on 14 November 1956 aged 53. He was survived by his mother, his wife, and their son. He was a skilled operator and a man of wise judgment, kindly and unassuming.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004932
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Borst, Hans Georg (1927 - 2022)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sarah Gillam
Publication Date 2022-10-13
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E010000-E010999/E010100-E010199
Occupation Cardiovascular surgeon Thoracic surgeon Cardiac surgeon Cardiothoracic surgeon
Details Hans Georg Borst, head of the division of cardiothoracic and vascular surgery at Hannover Medical School, Germany was an internationally renowned cardiovascular surgeon who made major contributions to the surgical treatment of aortic aneurysm and aortic dissections, and to the development of cardiac transplantation. He was born on 17 October 1927 in Munich, the son of Max Borst, the influential chairman of pathology at Munich University, and Margarete Borst. Borst attended school in Munich until early 1945, when he joined the Luftwaffe and subsequently spent six months in a British prisoner of war camp. On his return home, he finished his schooling, taking his final examinations (abitur) at Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria in 1947. He then worked as a labourer on a construction site for six months, a prerequisite for matriculation at the faculty of medicine, Munich University. After finishing his pre-clinical training in Munich, he transferred to Harvard Medical School in 1950, entering the second-year class and graduating in 1953. He was an intern in Emile Holman’s department of surgery at Stanford Hospital in San Francisco and then, from 1954 to 1956, a fellow in the department of physiology at Harvard School of Public Health, working with James L Whittenberger, Stanley Sarnoff, Erik Berglund and Jeremiah ‘Jere’ Mead. Here he produced seven papers on the developing fields of invasive cardiology and cardiac surgery. In late 1956 he returned to Germany and joined Rudolf Zenker at Marburg University. He applied his knowledge of the pathophysiology of extracorporeal circulation and was responsible for setting up extracorporeal circulation for the first open-heart procedures performed in Germany. His research resulted in two experimental papers on the combined use of the heart lung machine and moderate as well as deep hypothermia. In 1958 he moved to Munich University, following Zenker, who had been appointed chair of surgery, and completed his general surgical as well as thoracic and cardiovascular residencies there. In 1962 Borst presented his dozenten thesis on ‘The combination of extracorporeal circulation and hypothermia’, which was honoured with the von Langenbeck prize by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Chirurgie (the Germany Society for Surgery). While completing his residences, his interest was focused on thoracic aortic aneurysm. In 1963 he was the first surgeon to operate on the aortic arch in deep hypothermia and circulatory arrest. His laboratory work at that time dealt with myocardial blood flow during assisted circulation and induced ventricular fibrillation. In April 1968 he was appointed chairman of the department of surgery at the newly founded medical school of Hannover, and in 1971 he became head of the division of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery there. During the succeeding years, Borst and his department focused on several research topics, including: the consequences of temporary coronary occlusion; the effect of collateral blood flow in conjunction with cardioplegia; coronary and cerebral air embolism; the use of fibrin adhesive in thoracic and cardiovascular surgery; studies of the spinal cord during aortic cross clamping; and the preservation of the heart and lung in conjunction with transplantation. At Hannover he developed a large-scale operative programme in thoracic and cardiovascular surgery. Aside from the by then conventional surgery for valve and coronary heart disease, he and his department published extensively on: oesophagectomy for carcinoma of the oesophagus; thoracic aneurysms, especially new technologies in arch surgery; total correction of congenital anomalies in infancy; antiarrhythmic surgery; and clinical heart, heart lung and lung transplantation. In 1983 he and his colleagues introduced the ‘elephant trunk’ technique, a surgical aortic replacement for patients suffering from extensive aortic diseases. The technique helped to reduced complications during the repair of aortic aneurysms by performing a staged procedure. He was a founding member of the Deutschen Gesellschaft für Thorax-, Herz- und Gefäßchirurgie (the German Society for Thoracic, Cardiac and Vascular Surgery) and cofounded the European Association for Cardiothoracic Surgery (EACTS). The EACTS Hans G Borst award for thoracic aortic surgery is named in his honour. From 1978 to 1987 he was editor of *Thoraxchirurgie*. Under his leadership the journal was renamed *The Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeon*, was published in English and expanded to include cardiac surgery. In 1987 he was appointed as the founder editor of *The European Journal of Cardio-Thoracic Surgery*, the official journal of EACTS. He wrote more than 400 peer-reviewed papers and contributed to nearly 50 books. He was a member of many international associations and societies, including the British Cardiac Society, the Cardiothoracic Society (Pete’s Club, London), the Sociedad de Cardiocirujanos, Spain, the Société de Chirurgie Thoracique et Cardio-Vasculaire de Langue Française, the American Association for Thoracic Surgery, the American Surgical Association, the International Society for Cardiovascular Surgery and the International Society for Heart Transplantation. In 1987 he received the Erich Lexer prize of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Chirurgie for his work on cardiac transplantation. He became an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1989. Borst was married to Petra Angelika. They had four children – Mathias, Verena, Stefanie and Valerie – and nine grandchildren. Borst died on 8 September 2022. He was 94.
Resource Identifier RCS: E010163
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Pile, George Charles Laurie (1911 - 1963)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-04-28
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005200-E005299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377462377462
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born in Barbados on 21 September 1911, the son of Sir George Laurie Pile CBE, President of the Legislative Council of Barbados, and Emily Elizabeth Lyall, he was educated at Winchester, Caius College, Cambridge and the Middlesex Hospital. After qualifying in 1936 he held house appointments at the Middlesex Hospital including that of surgical registrar. During the war of 1939-45, being precluded by illness from joining the forces, he worked in the Middlesex sector at Harefield Hospital, where he took up thoracic work under Holmes Sellors and Vernon Thompson, and also acted as senior assistant in the thoracic department at the Middlesex Hospital. In 1946 he was appointed surgeon at Harefield Hospital under the London County Council, but in 1947 he moved to Oxford on being appointed thoracic surgeon to the United Oxford Hospitals, the Oxford Regional Hospital Board and to Beneden Chest Hospital. A humorous and kindly man with an enquiring and critical mind, he was also a keen sportsman, interested in cricket, tennis, golf and sailing. He died in the Radcliffe Infirmary on 8 January 1963 survived by his wife, son and daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005279
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Stephenson, Stephen Clements Frazer (1915 - 1996)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008300-E008399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380517380517
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Stephen Stephenson was born in Belfast on 5 August 1915. His parents were both graduates of Trinity College, Dublin, but had moved north. His father, John Lewis Irwin, was a schoolmaster and his mother Mabel, née Frazer, the daughter of a Methodist Minister. The family then moved to Bedford and Stephen spent eleven years as a pupil at Bedford School, where his father taught mathematics. Going up to St Mary's Hospital Medical School he qualified MB London in 1939. After his house jobs he was called up into the navy and spent four adventurous years as surgeon lieutenant in the RNVR. Following his war service he took junior surgical appointments first with Norman Tanner at St James's, Balham, and then with Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors at the London Chest Hospital. This post determined the direction of his subsequent career as consultant thoracic surgeon at the Birmingham General Hospital. He retired in 1980 before thoracic surgery had been entirely overtaken by cardiac surgery and had many years to enjoy his hobbies of gardening and golf. He married Mollie Wayman, a St Mary's nurse, in 1944. They had two daughters, one of whom has followed her mother's profession, and a son. Stephen Stephenson died on 1 December 1996.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008334
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Huang, Guo Jun (1920 - 2015)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Annie Wang
Publication Date 2015-12-10 2015-12-14
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009000-E009099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381197381197
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Guojun Huang was among the first generation of thoracic surgeons in China and, in the 1980's, a world leader in the treatment of oesophageal cancer. He was born on 2 November 1920 in Guangdong province, China, the son of Hejian Huang, a herbal medicine trader, and his wife Huiqin Liang. Guojun was born with clubfeet, and his father bent and bound his feet every day for years to correct the deformation. At the age of six, Guojun was able to stand and walk for the first time. He recounted this experience in an interview with China Central Television in 2004, when he was 84 years old, remembering vividly the pain of his deformity and the joy of having been cured of it. This joy was one of the reasons behind his determination to become a surgeon. Guojun Huang studied at Pui Ching High School, the most famous high school in Guangdong province, China, at the time. Besides excelling at maths, physics, biology and English, he also had a talent for the visual arts. His artwork was often selected for exhibitions. In 1939, Guojun graduated from Pui Ching with the highest honours and was awarded guaranteed admission to the prestigious pre-med programme at Yenching University, which was founded by American Christians and was one of the best universities in China. Just six months before he was due to take the medical school entrance exam, Yenching University was forcefully closed by the Japanese occupation after Japan declared war on the United States. Guojun Huang had to move to the medical school at St John's University in Shanghai and then, in the autumn of 1943, transferred as a second-year student to the Union Medical College of West China Union University (WCUU) in Chengdu, which had a joint programme with New York State University offering MD degrees. In 1948, he received his joint MD degree from New York State University and WCUU. Huang was offered a residency position at Garfield Hospital in Chicago, USA, but decided to remain in China, because he knew that he would be treating many more patients in China than in the USA. He chose Peking Union Hospital and found a great academic mentor, Yinkai Wu, the founder of thoracic surgery in China. After his internship, young doctor Guojun Huang joined Yinkai Wu's group, then at the leading edge of the specialty. Guojun Huang completed over 6,000 operations over the next 41 years. Some of his patients were statesmen from China and other countries, but most were ordinary Chinese farmers, miners and other workers. For example, commissioned by Premier Enlai Zhou, Huang went to the zinc mines in Yunnan province on seven occasions, treating miners with cancer and training local medical workers. Huang regarded each surgery as an art - he always chose the best way of cutting with minimum bleeding. The procedures he invented became the best treatment for oesophageal cancer in the world in the 1980's. He also initiated multidisciplinary rounds, consisting of surgeons, radiologists, pathologists and physicians of internal medicine, performing joint diagnosis and follow-up reviews after surgeries. This practice significantly enhanced the accuracy of doctors' diagnosis and improved the effectiveness of cancer treatment and raised survival rates. After China opened its door to the world in 1980's, Guojun Huang lectured dozens of times in the US, France, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Spain, Australia, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong and Japan, and received honorary fellowships from the top academic institutions in many of these countries. He was made an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1988. From 1964 to 1986, for 22 years, Huang was director of the surgical department at the Cancer Hospital at the Chinese Academy of Medical Science, the best hospital for cancer treatment and the most prestigious academic institute for cancer research in China. He led more than 50 surgeons and, as a full-time professor at the Union Medical School, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, taught over 350 PhD and masters students, as well as hundreds of interns and junior doctors from all over China. Huang published many books and over 200 journal articles as the sole or first author. Guojun Huang cared deeply about his patients. His son remembers one time when Guojun Huang rushed home in tears, taking his only cotton-padded jacket to give to a dying poor patient, who had dreamed of owning one all his life. The Tiananmen Square massacre of student protesters by the Chinese Government in 1989 made Guojun Huang indignant. He retired and relocated to the United States, joining his sons there in the same year. However, he remained a consultant, working at the Cancer Hospital for several months every year until 2014, when he was in the final stages of lymphoma. Guojun Huang had only one dream in his life: to be one of the best thoracic surgeons and to treat as many patients as possible, which he realised. In the eyes of all his colleagues and patients, Guojun Huang was a pure doctor in every sense of the word. Guojun Huang had a very happy marriage. His wife of 64 years, Shuru Guo, was his colleague and the head nurse of the operation rooms at Peking Union Hospital and then moved with him to the Cancer Hospital at the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences. Guojun Huang died on 30 January 2015, aged 94. He was survived by his widow, Shuru Guo, their sons, Alex Huang, Li Huang and Liping Huang, and seven grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009014
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ross, Donald Nixon (1922 - 2014)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sir Terence English
Publication Date 2014-08-15 2014-09-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005800-E005899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378011378011
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Donald Ross was one of the foremost British cardiac surgeons of his generation and was renowned for his innovations, superlative surgical technique and clinical acumen. He was also recognised as a great mentor for the many young surgeons who trained under him. He was born on 4 October 1922 in Kimberley, South Africa, of Scottish parents and studied medicine at the University of Cape Town, graduating with first class honours and the university gold medal. While there he was a direct contemporary of Christiaan Barnard and when Barnard went to Minneapolis for his surgical training, Donald Ross went to Britain, where he honed his surgical skills under Ronald Belsey in Bristol. However, his important move was to Guy's Hospital in 1953, where he became a senior registrar to Sir Russell (later Lord) Brock, who was one of the pioneers of British cardiac surgery. Ross flourished under his influence and in 1958 was appointed Brock's consultant colleague, so that the two men, each with very different skills, were able to establish the cardiothoracic unit at Guy's as one of the best in the country. With the advent of open heart surgery, Ross was soon expanding his interest and research into many aspects of the rapidly developing specialty, both in paediatrics and adult surgery. He was largely responsible for the Guy's-Ross heart-lung machine and had an abiding interest in the use of biological tissue rather than mechanical substitutes for replacing heart valves. In 1962 he was the first to use a homograft for replacement of the aortic valve. Later he expanded this concept, developing what became known as the 'Ross procedure', where the diseased aortic valve was replaced with the patient's own pulmonary valve, after which a homograft was placed in the pulmonary position. This was a particularly attractive option for young children as the re-implanted valve was shown to grow with the patient. In 1963 he was encouraged to split his practice between Guy's and the National Heart Hospital, where he joined Sir Thomas Sellors, another distinguished pioneer of cardiac surgery. It was there in May 1968 that he performed Britain's first heart transplant, Barnard having done the world's first in Cape Town six months earlier. The patient lived for 45 days and when two more case in 1968 and 1969 were unsuccessful, largely because the control of immunological rejection was imperfectly understood, a moratorium was placed on further attempts at heart transplants in the UK. This lasted for 10 years until the programme at Papworth Hospital was started. Donald Ross continued with an immensely arduous practice at both Guy's and the Heart Hospital and the latter became a Mecca for visiting surgeons to watch the master at work. In addition to his busy schedule at home, he travelled widely abroad to lecture and to operate and he had the distinction of introducing open heart surgery to India and Egypt. His following became such that surgeons who had trained under him or had been influenced by him established the Donald Ross Surgical Society. He was also in great demand at surgical meetings throughout the world and was honoured by many international colleges and surgical societies. Sadly and somewhat inexplicably, he was never awarded a British honour, which many felt was his due. His interests outside surgery included riding and breeding Arabian horses. With his first wife, Dorothy, he had a daughter, Janet, who is a consultant dermatologist. His second wife, Barbara, was his devoted and cheerful companion for the last 14 years of his long life. He died on 7 July 2014, aged 91.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005828
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Grundhill, Wilfred (1920 - 1983)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007200-E007299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379482379482
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Wilfred Grundhill was born on 2 March 1920 in Brakpan, where he matriculated at the local high school in 1938. His father had emigrated from England and was employed in the gold mining industry; he developed a lung problem and his son's interest in thoracic surgery was nurtured by this misfortune. He started his medical career in Johannesburg where he qualified MB, BCh in 1944. He was then on the staff of the Johannesburg General Hospital until July 1950 when he was awarded the Cecil John Adams Memorial Travelling Fellowship which enabled him to undertake postgraduate training in thoracic surgery in England and during this time he took his Fellowship in 1952. He then spent four years at the Harefield Hospital thoracic surgical unit. He returned to South Africa in 1956 and started practice in Bloemfontein as the first thoracic surgeon in the Orange Free State and was the pioneer and instigator of numerous advances in this province. Within months of this appointment he met and married a young staff nurse, Olga Doorman who, after training in the Netherlands had decided to work her way around the world with Bloemfontein as her first stop! Wilf threw himself into the work of developing the thoracic unit at the National Hospital with diligence and devotion. He was respected by his colleagues and loved by his patients. A theatre sister remembered him as always singing - even in the street. He also worked at Pelonomi Hospital and he was largely responsible for setting up the critical care facilities in the Free State. Patients no longer had to leave the area for cardiothoracic operations. He and Olga had three children, Carole, Wilf and Helene. Their son had acquired his MB, ChB and their youngest daughter was in her third year as a medical student in Johannesburg when Wilf collapsed while operating. In spite of a coronary artery procedure he died on 4 May 1983 survived by his wife and family.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007299
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Lawrence, Kingsley (1924 - 2001)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008700-E008799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380911380911
Occupation Cardiovascular surgeon Specialist in addiction medicine Thoracic surgeon
Details Kingsley Lawrance was born in London on 22 July 1924, into a Quaker family. His father, Henry, was a builder and contractor. His mother was Elsie Ruth née Ramsbotham. He was educated at Highgate School, from which he went to St Bartholomew's, qualifying in 1946. After a year on the house at Bart's, he went to Birmingham as a lecturer in anatomy, to study for and pass the FRCS. Despite his Quaker convictions, he felt he should offer his medical services, and did his National Service in the RAFVR, reaching the rank of squadron leader. On demobilisation, he underwent training in thoracic surgery at the Brompton Hospital and St Bartholomew's, where he was much influenced by Lord Brock, J B Hume and A H Hunt. In 1955, he was appointed senior registrar to Phillip Allison at the General Infirmary at Leeds, who, in 1957, sent him to the National Heart Institute, Bethesda, as a visiting scientist to study the new methods of cardiac by-pass, then being introduced. In 1961, he returned to the United States as an associate in surgery at the Indiana University Medical Center, Indianapolis, moving on to be clinical instructor in surgery at the University of California San Diego in 1969. There he was in private practice in thoracic and cardiovascular surgery for a decade, but began a period of alcohol addiction, for which he was successfully treated. Thereafter, he specialised in addiction medicine, undergoing further training and passing the appropriate boards. He married Alison Frances née Mallett in 1952, by whom he had two sons, Simon and Nicolas, and one daughter, Karen. There are three grandchildren. This marriage ended in divorce in 1980. He married for a second time, to Patricia Nelson, in 1992, but the marriage also ended in divorce within a year. He was close to his stepson, Evan. He died on 10 June 2001 in San Diego, California.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008728
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Nightingale, Doreen (1916 - 2002)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008800-E008899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381003381003
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Doreen Nightingale was a consultant thoracic surgeon at University College Hospital, London, and the National Temperance Hospital. She was a medical student at University College London, gaining her conjoint in 1939 and her MB BS in 1940, when she was the McGrath scholar in medicine. She went on to gain her FRCS and obtained her masters in surgery in 1945. She was a research fellow in surgery at Harvard University Medical School and Dorothy Temple Gross research fellow in tuberculosis in 1947. She returned to be the first assistant and deputy director on the (professorial) surgical unit at UCH. In 1955, she was appointed as consultant thoracic surgeon at UCH and surgeon to the National Temperance Hospital. This was the first time that a thoracic surgeon had been appointed to the staff and initially her work was tuberculosis- related. She contracted pulmonary TB herself and underwent successful treatment. As pulmonary tuberculosis and bronchiectasis almost completely disappeared from the wards, cancer of the lung and diseases of the oesophagus increased. Techniques of open-heart surgery were investigated experimentally in the medical school and she carried out the clinical cases. However, the expensive resources of staff and equipment were not supported, and the referrals dwindled. She was a technically excellent and speedy surgeon, kindly, but able to put fear into students and juniors who did not follow her commands. One of her interests was splenectomy for anaemias and, as Camden Town had a large population of Greek Cypriots, thalassaemia was common. One of her registrars recalls difficulties in removing an enormous ruptured spleen in the middle of the night and, as she lived near UCH in the White House, he was thankful for her speedy appearance in the theatre and her even more speedy and successful removal of the spleen. She married her long-term friend Hugh Burt when it was known that he was terminally ill. She retired from UCH in 1981 and died on 20 December 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008820
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Harrison, George Kent (1907 - 1987)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-18 2015-06-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007300-E007399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379498379498
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details George Kent Harrison was born on 25 September 1907, in London, Ontario. His father, George William Harrison, was a banker. He was educated at Bishop's College, Quebec, Appleby College, Ontario, and the University of Toronto Medical School where he graduated MD in 1931. His resident appointments were at Toronto General Hospital and he was awarded a Leverhulme Scholarship at the Royal College of Surgeons shortly before the second world war. He joined the RAMC, and commanded No.8 Field Surgical Unit in the 8th Army at Alamein. He became Lieutenant-Colonel in command of the surgical division of a general hospital. After the war, he became thoracic surgeon to the London County Council, and later thoracic surgeon to Papworth and Addenbrooke's for four years and finally to St Thomas's Hospital, where he joined Norman Barrett. The hospital was at that time taking its first steps in cardiac surgery, and Harrison's wide experience of pulmonary and oesophageal surgery was of great benefit. From 1952, he was consultant thoracic surgeon to the Royal Navy and the RAMC. In his spare time he enjoyed playing tennis and squash and other interests included swimming and photography. In 1939, he married Mary Marryat, a great-niece of Captain Marryat, and a painter. She pre-deceased him and he was survived by their four sons and three daughters; Malcolm, Cecil, John, Stephen, Kent, Louise and Lucy, one of them a nurse, when he died on 15 November 1987.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007315
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Susman, Maurice Philip (1898 - 1988)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007600-E007699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379876379876
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Maurice Philip Susman was born in Sydney, Australia, on 4 August 1898, the son of Philip Susman, a merchant, and Gertrude, née Lehane. His early education was at Sydney Church of England Preparatory School and Sydney Church of England Grammar School, afterwards entering the University of Sydney for medical studies. He qualified in 1921 and was initially resident medical officer at the Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney, working under Sir Alexander McCormick. He came to England for postgraduate studies working at the Brompton Hospital under Mr Arthur Tudor Edwards and passing the FRCS in 1925. After returning to Australia he passed the FRACS in 1930 and was appointed honorary surgeon to Sydney Hospital and honorary thoracic surgeon to the Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney. Shortly after the outbreak of war he joined the Australian Imperial Forces as a surgical specialist with the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, serving in Greece, Crete and Syria and after demobilisation returned to his previous civilian posts until his retirement. Throughout his life he had always been interested in flying and he obtained his pilot's licence in 1928. At the end of 1964, after retirement he spent three months with the flying doctor service in Queensland. He also undertook many locum consultant posts in the National Health Service in Great Britain. He married a Miss Shanahan in 1934 and they had a daughter, Jenny. He died after a short illness on 13 September 1988, aged 90, and is survived by his wife and daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007693
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hoffman, Eugene (1914 - 1997)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-03
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008600-E008699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380853380853
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Eugene Hoffman was a consultant surgeon in the Middlesbrough area, specialising in thoracic surgery. He was born in Zilina, Slovakia, in 1914, the youngest of a family of five. He studied medicine in Prague before the second world war. In 1939 his parents were uneasy about the political situation - the frontiers were closed - but they sent the boys into Italy through a small Slovakian border crossing, ostensibly on holiday. Eugene wished to cross into France and join an army to fight the Germans. He made three attempts, two by water and one overland, but was caught and sent back to Italy each time. Eventually, just before war was declared, he went to the French embassy. They were busy packing up to go, but he managed to get a visa and went to France by boat quite legally. Once there, he looked around to see what he could join: he considered the French Foreign Legion, but they did not need doctors, so he joined the Czech Army as a medic. They were posted to Agde near the Spanish border and were later evacuated by the Royal Navy and brought to England. He stayed in the Czech Army until the end of the war and was then repatriated. He worked in Prague and became assistant surgeon (senior registrar) in a leading surgical clinic. However, he was uneasy about the political situation in Communist Czechoslovakia and one day read in the *Times* that England was allowing foreign graduates to practice without taking basic English examinations. He at once packed his belongings, resigned from the clinic and drove to England. He obtained a job at the Mildmay Hospital, where he had worked while in the Czech Army. He studied for and eventually passed the FRCS and then went to Shotley Bridge, where he specialised in thoracic surgery, working with George Mason, Selwyn Griffin and Raymond Dobson. He moved on, becoming a consultant at the Poole Hospital, Middlesbrough. He campaigned for the treatment of road accidents *in situ*, on which he wrote extensively, being awarded an Hunterian Professorship in 1976. His vision for emergency treatment at the roadside is today realised in the paramedic ambulance service. He married Betty, a consultant anaesthetist, in 1962. They had one daughter, Clare. He died on 3 January 1997.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008670
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Temple, Leslie Joseph (1915 - 2004)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-10-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372323372323
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Leslie Temple was a consultant thoracic surgeon at Broadgreen Hospital, Liverpool. He was born in London in 1915 and studied medicine at University College Hospital. After qualifying in 1939, he completed house posts in Aylesbury and Canterbury, and was then a resident surgical officer at Wigan Infirmary, Lancashire, where he gained his FRCS in 1941. Joining the RAMC, he served with a field hospital on the Normandy beaches on D-Day, and was later posted to Belgium and then India. Following demobilisation in 1947, he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon at Broadgreen Hospital, Liverpool. He was also a consultant to Nobles Hospital, in Douglas on the Isle of Man, and to Machynlleth Hospital, mid Wales. He made significant contributions to the treatment of lung cancer and tuberculosis in both adults and children. In 1962 he carried out some of the first open heart operations in England for mitral valve disease, and went on to help establish Liverpool as a major centre for cardiac surgery. Surgeons from around the world, including Australia, Canada, Greece and the Sudan, were trained and encouraged by him. Outside medicine, he was a keen squash player and an avid hill-walker, once completing ascents of Snowdon, Scafell Pike and Ben Nevis within 24 hours. On his 80th birthday he led a party of family and friends round the Snowdon Horseshoe. After he retired he took a three-year BA degree course in humanities at Chester College, University of Liverpool, graduating with honours in 2001. He died from an aortic dissection on 10 July 2004. He was predeceased by his wife, Barbara, and leaves a son, John, and a daughter, Anne. There are six grandchildren, one of whom, Andrew John, is a surgeon and an FRCS. There are three great grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000136
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Grace, Archibald John (1905 - 1964)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-06-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005500-E005599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377706377706
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born at Allahabad, India, of Canadian parents who were missionaries, on 24 January 1905, he won a scholarship to the University of Saskatchewan, graduated with silver and gold medals, and was a demonstrator of physiology. He won a Rhodes scholarship to St John's College, Oxford, where he graduated with first class honours in physiology, and also played hockey for the University. He received his clinical training at Guy's Hospital, and held resident posts at the Dudley Road Hospital, Birmingham, the Royal Victoria, Montreal, and the Humber Clinic, Cornerbrook, Newfoundland. Returning to England he was surgical registrar at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, and at Guy's. He was appointed Associate Professor in 1936 and later became Professor of Surgery at the University of Western Ontario, London, Canada, where he practised for the rest of his life. He became Chief of the Thoracic Surgery departments at the Victoria Hospital and the War Memorial Children's Hospital, and was consulting thoracic surgeon to St Joseph's Hospital and the Beck Memorial Sanatorium. Grace was an excellent teacher, popular with his colleagues, students and patients. He excelled in all he touched, and was a keen shot and fisherman, fond also of golf and curling. He was a good photographer, and much interested in politics and religion, cherishing the simple faith learned from his parents. He married in 1936 Mary Kathleen Disney of Northampton, who survived him with their eight children; one daughter, Dr Noelle Grace, was a resident at the Royal Victorian Hospital, Montreal in 1964. Grace died at London, Western Ontario after two years illness on 7 September 1964, aged 59. Publication: Ureamia. *Guy's Hospital Gaz* 1932
Resource Identifier RCS: E005523
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Chesterman, Judson Tyndale (1903 - 1987)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-04-27
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007100-E007199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379338379338
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Judson Tyndale Chesterman was born on 16 February 1903, the fourth son of a Bath solicitor, William Thomas Chesterman, and his wife, Elizabeth, nee Clapton. He was educated at Monkton Combe School and distinguished himself in his medical training at Bristol by winning many of the prizes including gold medals in medicine, surgery and gynaecology. He held house appointments at the London Hospital, Great Ormond Street and the Radcliffe Infirmary, before becoming a registrar in thoracic surgery in Sheffield. This became his chosen career in which he excelled by being elected an Hunterian Professor at the College, Arris and Gale lecturer and Erasmus Wilson demonstrator. He achieved further recognition as a research assistant in surgery at the Barnes Hospital in St Louis. He was appointed to the City General Hospital in Sheffield as a consultant in thoracic surgery and became one of the outstanding pioneers in open heart surgery. He developed a 'heart-lung' maching which is now displayed in the hospital museum. During his training he was much influenced by Professor Rendle Short in Bristol, Professor H B Yates in Sheffield and Professor Evarts Graham in St Louis, Minnesota. In 1945 he published a book on the treatment of acute intestinal obstruction and was the author of sixty-five other papers. He had deep religious beliefs with compassion for those less fortunate than himself. His interests included mountaineering and archeology which led to his special expertise on palaeopathology. Three years before his death he was climbing and conducting archaeological research in Peru. In his earlier days he was keen on swimming and represented the University in water polo. In 1939 he married Sheila, a doctor, who survives him with his son, daughter and grand-children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007155
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Mason, George Alexander (1901 - 1971)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-09-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005900-E005999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378120378120
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details George Alexander Mason was born in 1901 and graduated from Newcastle-upon-Tyne University in 1922 and spent the whole of his professional life in that city. Although in every sense a general surgeon he soon became interested in thoracic surgery and devoted most of his surgical career to that specialty. He obtained his FRCS in 1931 and soon afterwards he was appointed to the staff of the Royal Infirmary Newcastle-upon-Tyne, he was also on the staff of the Shotley Bridge Hospital where he first developed a department of thoracic surgery. During the second world war he served in the Royal Navy as Surgeon-Commander RNVR; he also maintained thoracic clinics at Nottingham and at Preston Hall in Kent. Mason was a pioneer in thoracic surgery, and was a founder member of the Association of Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain; he was also one of the first in the world to write of his experiences with successful removal of the whole lung. He was made a Hunterian Professor of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1933 and 1936. He worked with Laurence O'Shaughnessy at the College of Surgeons until the outbreak of war in 1939. After the war Mason travelled widely, and gathered a small group of thoracic surgeons who with him visited clinics in Europe and America. Probably his closest association was with Norway and many young Norwegian surgeons joined the Shotley Clinic to learn under his guidance, and the gratitude of the Norwegian Government for his contribution to Norwegian surgery was expressed by its making him a Knight of St Olaf. Mason died suddenly while staying at the Norwegian Embassy in Canberra on 5 March 1971, and was survived by his wife and son and daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005937
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barrett, Henry Campbell (1903 - 1989)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-04-17
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007100-E007199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379287379287
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Henry Barrett was born on 7 November 1903 in Timaru, New Zealand, the son of Henry, a farmer, and his wife Annie, née Campbell. One of his mother's uncles had the distinction of being physician to the Czar of Russia. He received his education at Hamilton High School where he distinguished himself in hockey and rugby, and was also head prefect. His medical training was obtained at Otago University where he won the Batchelor Memorial Medal for surgery and won a blue for hockey and rifle shooting. His surgical training continued at Dunedin with a spell in England in 1933 at Bedford and the West London Hospitals. On his return to New Zealand he became a registrar at Waikato and finally on the staff at the New Plymouth Hospital where he became successively, superintendent, visiting surgeon and medical officer of special scale over a period from 1942 to 1977. Henry Barrett was a pioneer in thoracic surgery with recorded evidence of a successful ligation of the patent ductus arteriosus in 1947 and a repair of a trachea-oesophageal fistula in the same year. Sadly he did not publish details of these occasions although they are recorded in the Australasian archives. His sporting interest continued throughout his career and he enjoyed golf, tennis and watching rugby. Latterly he spent time helping on his family dairy farms at New Plymouth with his two younger sons. In 1931 he married Lily Viva Storey, a nurse at Waikato Hospital and they had three sons and a daughter. The eldest son, John Campbell Barrett, is a consultant anaesthetist. Henry Barrett retired in 1978 and died on 28 February 1989, aged 85.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007104
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Sanderson, John Maxwell (1918 - 1995)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-01
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008300-E008399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380501380501
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details John Maxwell Sanderson was born on 9 September 1918 in Birmingham. His father, Mark Albert, was a lamp manufacturer and his mother was Helen Kate Church, a farmer's daughter. He attended York House Preparatory School in Birmingham, followed by King Edward's High School. From there he went to Birmingham University Medical School with an entrance scholarship. His medical career was marked by some distinction. He gained honours in anatomy, materia medica, hygiene and public health and 2nd class honours in the MB ChB examination. After qualifying he worked as a house surgeon, house physician and registrar in surgery at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, and then as a registrar at the Brompton Hospital in London and a senior registrar in thoracic surgery at Queen Elizabeth Hospital and Birmingham Regional Hospital Board. He was senior registrar in thoracic surgery at the London Hospital from 1951 to 1952 and was appointed consultant surgeon to North Staffordshire Hospital in 1952. He was subsequently appointed to a joint unit with Keele University and he established the Dunn Unit of Cardiology there. The University awarded him an honorary DSc in 1986. During the war he served in the Merchant Navy from 1942 to 1945 as a ship's surgeon. He served as Chairman of the British Standards Committee for cardiovascular implants. He published on chemotherapy and pulmonary tuberculosis in 1963 and brain damage in dogs following pulsatile and non-pulsatile flow in extra-corporeal circulation in 1972. In 1944 he married Jessie Duncan Brown and they had a daughter and a son. He was a keen and dedicated golfer and as a scratch player in his youth had represented Warwickshire. He died on 2 February 1995 survived by his children, his wife having pre-deceased him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008318
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Mehta, Meherji Phiroze Mancherji (1917 - 1983)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-06-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007500-E007599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379683379683
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Meherji Mehta was born on 5 April 1917 at Navsari and went to school at Elphinstone and Xavier's College before entering the Grant Medical College and JJ Hospital in Bombay where he qualified in 1939. He took his master's degree in surgery from Bombay University in October 1942 securing a distinction. He joined the Indian Army Medical Service and was promoted to the rank of surgeon on a regular commission but resigned in 1948. He continued his surgical training and developed a particular interest in thoracic surgery at Frenchay Hospital in Bristol. After passing the FRCS examination in 1951 he returned to India and joined the faculty at the Parsee General Hospital before his appointment to the staff at Grant Medical College and JJ Hospital. In 1960 he was promoted to Professor in the department of thoracic and cardiovascular surgery where he became a pioneer in open heart surgery. He was the first surgeon in India to use biological heart valves and in 1974 he performed the first successful coronary artery by-pass. In 1973 he also accepted the additional post of senior surgeon at the Jaslok Hospital until his retirement in 1975. Dr Mehta was a very popular teacher and colleague and an inspiration to many young surgeons in training. He was a Fellow of the International College of Angiology, member of the International Federation of Surgeons and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain. In 1973 he was elected President of the Association of Surgeons of India. He died on 7 July 1983.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007500
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Whytehead, Lawrence Layard (1914 - 2005)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-11-22 2008-03-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372614372614
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Lawrence Whytehead was a thoracic surgeon in Manitoba, Canada. He was born in Easty, Kent, on 7 February 1914 and educated at St Edmund’s and Charterhouse. He went on to study medicine at Oriel College, Oxford, and then Middlesex Hospital, qualifying in 1938. During the Second World War he served in the RAF in North Africa, specialising in thoracic surgery when he returned to the UK. He was a senior registrar in thoracic surgery at Guy’s Hospital and then first assistant at Brompton Hospital. At Guy’s he published, with Brock, an influential paper on radical pneumonectomy for carcinoma of the lung. He was the first recipient of the Evarts Graham memorial travelling fellowship, which took him to the Massachusetts General Hospital, where he met and married Nancy, a nurse, who came back to England with him. In the early 1950s he was appointed as a consultant surgeon at the Brook and Grove Park hospitals. In 1955 he emigrated to Canada, where he set up in practice in thoracic surgery at the Manitoba Clinic. He retired in 1979. He was very active in church affairs. He taught in Sunday school, was a delegate to the General Synod of the Anglican Church and wrote a book on religious issues (Dying: considerations concerning the passage from life to death, Toronto, Anglican Book Centre, 1980). He was on the board of Agape Table, the Manitoba Interfaith Immigration Council and the Interfaith Pastoral Institute, which became the Aurora Family Therapy Centre. Many doctors from overseas were helped by Lawrence to qualify for practice in Canada. He had many other interests, and in retirement at his cottage in Minaki he enjoyed the company of his grandchildren. He died on 10 July 2005 in Winnipeg, leaving his widow Nancy (née Anderson) and four daughters, Mary Holmen, Louise Hunter, Jennifer Copeland and Catherine Whytehead.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000430
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Boctor, Helmy Bassili (1907 - 1961)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-01-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004900-E004999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377091377091
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Helmy Boctor was born in Cairo in December 1907, the youngest child in a family of five. He was educated at the Maronite School, Faggala, and at "Fouad el Awal", Abassieh. He studied medicine at the University of Cairo, qualified in 1932, and held several resident appointments at the Kasr-el-Aini Hospital. He obtained the Primary Fellowship at the examination held in Cairo in 1936. In 1938 he came to London to take his Final Fellowship, which he obtained in 1941. From December 1941 to July 1942 he held the post of house surgeon at the Worthing Hospital, and was then appointed surgical registrar there. In this year 1942 he married. As his main interest was thoracic surgery, he visited many chest clinics in London and the provinces. He was appointed house surgeon and then registrar at the Brompton Hospital, the first Egyptian to hold this post, and worked for Sir Clement Price Thomas and Lord Brock. At the end of 1944 he returned to Egypt and was appointed chest surgeon in the Egyptian Ministry of Health. He was a very progressive surgeon and performed many lobectomies and pneumonectomies, as well as the whole range of thoracic operations. He found he had just as good results by operating between the ribs instead of resecting a rib. He published his results in many journals. Boctor was a member of the American Thoracic Society. He acted as an editor in 1948 of *Excerpta Medica*, the Dutch-American abstracting service. Besides his government work he operated at the Halion, Coptic, and Dar-el-Chefa Hospitals. In 1956 he was sent by the World Health Organisation to England and Norway for three months for postgraduate study. He made a trip to Europe every two years to read papers on his special subject, and attended many congresses. In 1961 he travelled to Germany to visit the various heart clinics. He was a cheerful colleague, who was deeply interested in thoracic surgery. He died on 10 September 1961 of coronary thrombosis. His wife and their two daughters survived him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004908
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ferguson, William Glasgow (1919 - 2005)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-15 2014-08-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372352372352
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details William Glasgow Ferguson, or 'Fergie' as he was known, was a thoracic surgeon in Victoria, Australia. He was born in Whitley Bay, Northumberland, on 4 March 1919, the son of William and Sara Ferguson. He studied medicine at Durham, where he qualified in 1942. After four months as a house surgeon at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle upon Tyne, he joined the RAMC and was posted to 144 Field Ambulance, Hull, and in the following March went to Accra, where he served in 2 (WA) Field Ambulance until April 1944, when he went with his field ambulance to Burma. There he was promoted to major and, in the following year, commanded 4 (WA) Field Ambulance with the rank of lieutenant colonel, being mentioned in despatches. At the end of the war he brought his field ambulance back to West Africa and was demobilised in 1946. On his return to the UK, he became a demonstrator of anatomy at the University of Durham, did general surgical training at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, completed the Guy's course and passed the final FRCS. He then decided to specialise in thoracic surgery, undergoing specialist registrar and senior registrar posts at the Royal Victoria Infirmary and the Shotley Bridge Regional Thoracic Surgical Centre. He was awarded the American Association for Thoracic Surgery travelling fellowship in 1953 as a post-doctoral first assistant. In 1958 he moved to Australia, as staff superintendent of Sydney Hospital. Two years later, he became a consultant at Goulburn Valley Base Hospital, Victoria, where he remained until he retired in 1985. He then continued in general practice in Omeo, Victoria, until 1992. He was previously married to Helen née Cowan. He had three children - two sons (Tim and Richard) and a daughter (Lisa). He died in Omeo, Victoria, on 20 July 2005, aged 86. He was also survived by a partner, Anne.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000165
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Churchill, Edward Delos (1895 - 1972)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-10-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006200-E006299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378403378403
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Edward Delos Churchill was born in Chenoa, Illinois, in 1895. In 1920 he graduated from Harvard Medical School and spent the next four years at the Massachusetts General Hospital. For the next three years he was a Dalton Scholar with Cecil Drinker, and then held a Moseley Travelling Fellowship, which enabled him to spend a year with Krogh in Copenhagen. He returned to the Massachusetts General Hospital in 1927 and joined the full-time department of surgery. He channelled his investigative talents into the field of cardiopulmonary physiology and shock, and his clinical interests into thoracic surgery. In 1928 he moved his laboratories to the Boston City Hospital as part of an effort to create a full-time surgical counterpart of the Thorndike memorial. Two years later he returned to the Massachusetts General Hospital, and in 1931 he became Homans Professor and chief, and he held this position until his retirement in 1962. In 1943 he went overseas as colonel and surgical consultant to the North African-Mediterranean Theatre of Operations, and won a Distinguished Service Medal at the end of the second world war. In 1946 he served as President of. the American Surgical Association and there presented his historic analysis of intellectual trends in surgery under the title of *Science and humanism*. In 1948 he was awarded the Honorary Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. In 1972 he published the classic *Surgeon to soldiers. A diary and records of the Surgical Consultant Allied Forces Headquarters, World War II*. In 1962 Churchill retired from the hospital and university, but was available in an advisory role at his home in Belmont. He became interested in the history of wound management, particularly military, and devoted his time to his study and his farm, and enjoyed the companionship of his wife Mary and their four children, and grandchildren. On 28 August 1972 enjoying a long walk on his farm, he was stricken with a fatal cardiovascular attack.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006220
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Price, Arthur Kenneth (1910 - 1963)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-04-28 2014-11-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005200-E005299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377470377470
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details The following obituary was published in volume 4: Born on 27 December 1910 and educated at Wycliffe Grammar School, Croydon, he received his medical education at St Thomas's Hospital where he qualified in 1933, obtaining honours in the BS London final examination. After qualification he held a succession of surgical appointments including that of surgical registrar, having passed the Final Fellowship examination at the age of 24. Later he held appointments at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, Sheffield Royal Infirmary, and Selly Oak Hospital, Birmingham. He joined the RAMC in 1942 and served as a major with a Field Surgical Unit in North Africa and Italy, where he contracted infective jaundice. After the war he decided to take up thoracic surgery and, after five years as a thoracic surgeon at Frenchay Hospital, Bristol, he became consultant thoracic surgeon in the Bath area of the SW region. He married Lois Turner in 1945 by whom he had two daughters. He died at his home in Bath on 25 April 1963 after three or four years of ill health. A memorial service was held in the church of St Michael with St Paul, Bath, on 15 May at which an address was given by Professor Harold Rodgers OBE, FRCS. The following obituary was published in volume five: Arthur Kenneth Price was a student at St Thomas's Hospital and graduated MB BS London and also took the Conjoint Diploma in 1933. After junior surgical appointments at St Thomas's Hospital he became resident surgical officer at the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford and passed the Final Fellowship in 1935. He decided to specialise in thoracic surgery, and was appointed thoracic surgeon to the Bristol Royal Infirmary. Price ultimately settled in Bath, where he became a consultant in general and thoracic surgery in the Bath Clinical Area. He was a member of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, and contributed chapters on bronchoscopy, oesophagoscopy and thoracoscopy to Rob and Smith's *Operative surgery*, 1957. He died on 25 April 1963.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005287
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barnsley, William Corbitt (1917 - 1982)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-11-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006300-E006399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378484378484
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details William Corbitt Barnsley was educated at South Shields High School and graduated in medicine from Armstrong College, Newcastle upon Tyne, where, as an undergraduate, he won many prizes and medals. After a period at Newcastle General Hospital, where he gained general experience in surgery, he proceeded to the newly formed unit of thoracic surgery as house officer. He remained in thoracic surgery for the rest of his life, becoming consultant thoracic surgeon in 1952. He became one of the early members of the Thoracic Society and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons. He was at one time President of the North of England Thoracic Society. The volume of work that Corbitt encompassed during his 42 years in his speciality was enormous. Perhaps lung cancer and asbestosis were his prime interests, though he wrote papers on other subjects including the oesophagus. He believed in a radical approach to endothelioma of the pleura and gave many years of comfort, with some apparent cures, to patients with this appalling malady. Having a remarkable memory he could conjure up x-ray appearances of many years ago to help elucidate modern problems. In 1977 the cardiothoracic surgical service was transferred to the new, superbly equipped Freeman Hospital. Corbitt left Shotley regretfully as his life's work had been there. He continued his unstinting service, however, and was in administrative charge of the augmented unit from 1980. Staff remembered him for his dry, impish humour and his 'wagging finger and almost shuffling gait'. He was unfailingly kind and compassionate and colleagues constantly turned to him for advice. He retired in 1982 at the age of 65 and his friends hoped he would enjoy a long retirement. Both he and his wife had borne much illness and also the death of Pam, their only daughter (a pathologist in Sheffield), in 1979. He died on 2 June 1982 survived by his wife Hilda and three sons.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006301
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Waterfall, Muriel Cornish (1920 - 1990)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-08-12
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007700-E007799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379894379894
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Muriel Cornish Waterfall, one of four daughters of William Duncan Waterfall, (née Cornish) a teacher, was born in Muswell Hill, London on 23 December 1920. She was educated at Tollington Preparatory School, Muswell Hill, and at St George's School, Harpenden, Herts, where she won a number of prizes. She then trained at Manchester Medical School and the Royal Free Hospital Medical School, and graduated in 1944. After house surgeon appointments she secured the FRCS, aged 25, in 1946, and became resident surgical officer at Essex County Hospital, Colchester; surgical registrar at Winchester and the Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith, and senior registrar at Brompton Hospital. She also worked for a short time at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, and at the Lahey Clinic, Boston. In later years she acknowledged her indebtedness to Heneage Ogilvie, Russell Brock and Harry Platt. She was appointed consultant surgeon to Kingston General Hospital, also to the New Victoria Hospital, Kingston, and the Royal Hospital, Richmond. Throughout that period she did both general and thoracic surgery. She was a member of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland and a regular supporter of surgical meetings. She was a skilful and conscientious surgeon who never spared herself in the service of her patients. She was to be seen in her hospitals at all hours of the day and night and was always a loyal and helpful colleague. Having spent her annual leave in Nepal in 1980 and in the subsequent two years as a locum surgeon, she retired early and went back to Nepal in 1985. Despite poor health she also did locum as a surgeon in Ascension Island, in Zambia and the United Kingdom and gave much aid to the elderly. Although she never married she took a great interest in the lives of her one brother and three sisters (one of whom is a consultant anaesthetist), and also those of her twelve nieces and nephews. She was an unassuming woman of warm simplicity, good humour and outgoing kindness, who died on 1 July 1990, aged 69.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007711
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sturridge, Marvin Francis (1926 - 2017)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Tom Treasure
Publication Date 2017-02-17 2017-05-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E009000-E009999/E009300-E009399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381496381496
Occupation Cardiac surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Marvin Sturridge was a consultant thoracic surgeon at the Middlesex Hospital, London. He was born on 12 September 1926 to Frank Sturridge, a doctor, and Helen Sturridge. He was the third son of what was to be a family of seven brothers and a sister, Gloria, who only lived ten days. He and all his siblings were delivered by Uncle Reg Sturridge at home. At the age of six, having had measles along with his brothers, Marvin developed an abscess which led to streptococcal septicaemia. This was in the 1930's; there were no antibiotics. The infection lodged in his joints, causing severe damage to both hips and shoulders. This resulted a lifelong disability, with which he lived and worked with stoicism. During this time, Marvin was looked after by a doctor to whom he was particularly grateful because, unlike others, he did not sit on his bed, anticipating the excruciating pain the movement would cause. This thoughtful care, which he reflected on, was part of the inspiration that set the course of Marvin's life and the gentleness which he always exhibited with his own patients. Marvin was confined to bed for the next two years. Initially, there was doubt whether he would walk again, and he said it was thanks to his brothers who, not given to undue sympathy, told him he would never walk again. That made him the more determined to get on his feet, for which he was eternally grateful. He was given a tricycle, which helped him, very slowly, to regain strength in his legs, and eventually he was able to walk. His brothers, Arthur and Jerome, were at Ladycross Prep School in Seaford, and Marvin was eventually deemed well enough to join them there as a boarder. While there, he had a recurrence of his illness, this time in his right shoulder, and again, recovery was very slow. In 1941, he was accepted at University College School, then just down the road, where he enjoyed great success as cox in the school's rowing eight, his first sporting experience. It was from there that he gained entry to the Middlesex Hospital as a student, joining his brother Jerome. He had further recurrences of his illness until 1947, when penicillin finally eradicated the infection. After qualifying in 1952, he did house officer jobs at the Middlesex and was surgical registrar there and at St Andrew's Hospital, Billericay. Around this time, while working for his fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons, in his own words: 'There came a young woman of striking beauty, who by virtue of playing hard to get, became my irresistible object of desire.' This was the lovely June Rowley. Their first date was to the funfair on Hampstead Heath in August 1956 and they married on 8 February 1958. Keen to pursue a surgical career, he applied for various posts in cardiothoracic and plastic surgery; he was informed by a senior surgeon that there was no future in plastic surgery so he chose the alternative. In the early 1960's, Marvin and June, with their two very young children, moved to Minnesota and the Mayo Clinic, where he worked with John Kirklin for a year. This was barely six or seven years after Kirklin reported the first successful series of operations on cardiopulmonary bypass. Returning to London from the Mayo Clinic, he was appointed first assistant in surgery on a rotation that took him to the Brompton, the London Chest and the National Heart hospitals. He was appointed as a consultant at the Middlesex and at the London Chest hospitals. In addition to adult work, he did congenital heart surgery in children, having trained with Kirklin, Brock and Holmes Sellors. When the paediatric cardiologist retired during the 1980s, he conferred with his colleagues and saw that these operations, which he loved to do and did well, should be done in dedicated centres. Another very special part of his work was thymectomy for myasthenia gravis, which he did most weeks as an honorary consultant thoracic surgeon to the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, Queen Square. Marvin was a fine example of a London teaching hospital surgeon of this era. He had a sound knowledge of applied physiology honed with Kirklin at the Mayo Clinic and Russell Brock at the Brompton. With Kirklin he studied the metabolic rate after cardiac surgery and published the study in the *Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery* in 1964 ('Basal metabolic rate after cardiovascular surgery' *J Thorac Cardiovasc Surg*. 1964 Mar;47:298-307). While at the Brompton, he did a meticulous study of the tenuous blood supply of trachea and proximal bronchi. This gained him his master of surgery degree and was evident in his clinical expertise in managing the pneumonectomy space. Persuaded somehow that an MS in the library of the University of London was sufficient, he didn't publish the work. Well after his retirement, much less informative images of the vasculature were shown at the European Society of Thoracic Surgeons and Marvin was persuaded to get out the thesis. The images were at last published after more than 40 years in the *Annals of Thoracic Surgery* in 2007 ('Blood supply of the trachea and proximal bronchi' *Ann Thorac Surg*. 2007 Aug;84[2]:675). Between these publications, he was an author on more the 50 papers, covering a range of important contributions to the science of cardiothoracic surgery. He wrote a textbook of thoracic surgery with his senior colleague, Jack Belcher, which reached a fifth edition as *Belcher's thoracic surgical management* in 1985 (London, Baillière Tindall). Marvin was an outstanding teacher of clinical medicine and always had a firm of students. He was also a superb apprentice master in the operating theatre, teaching the essential craftwork of surgery to the many rotating registrars who went on to work in other specialties, as well as many specialist registrars who became consultant surgeons in the rapidly growing specialty of cardiac surgery in the 1970's to 1990's. What was remarkable was his stamina and good humour, when only those who knew him well realised how often he had episodes of pain, particularly in his hips. In his sixties, Marvin's hips began to cause episodic severe pain but, fearing that surgery might make things worse, he procrastinated until retirement and then went to see Sarah Muirhead-Allwood, the doyenne of revision hip surgery. He gave up his beloved pipe and, although not easy one suspects for either surgeon or patient, the operations were an eventual great success and made him two inches taller. He wrote to his surgeon 'now for the first time in my life I understand why people go on walks for pleasure'. Sometimes he reflected that it was a pity he didn't go sooner, but when asked if he was bitter or resentful about his childhood illness which left him partially disabled, his face lit up and he said: 'Absolutely not, why would I? It made me the person I am today and dictated the path I took.' Our memory of Marvin in his heyday was of a man of dapper appearance, an immaculately tailored suit with a special hanger and an inside pocket for his stethoscope, never without his bow tie, yellow socks and his pipe. He loved cars and in the early fifties he competed, with his brother Jerome, in the London Motor Club Rally to Wales in a Sunbeam Talbot 90, a rally lasting some 36 hours, finishing a very respectable 38th place out of 300 entries. Marvin and June retired to Felpham, Sussex in 1991 to a cottage where the family had had many happy holidays. With his new hips, he was now able to walk along the seafront to the Boat House Café to meet with friends for a cappuccino. He latterly had to use a stick and later a scooter, but he was determined to get there. In March 2014 he suffered a subdural haematoma and had surgery and months of hospitalisation. Wheelchair life bored him and, again, he was determined to walk. His nurses had to fit an alarm to his wheelchair to alert them when he decided to walk on his own. Although his faculties were failing, he looked forward to doing the cryptic crossword on Wednesdays, always with a smile, and this he did right up to the day he left us. Marvin Sturridge died on 19 January 2017, aged 90, and was survived by his wife June, his four children, Paul, Jacky, Nicola and Jonathan (always known as 'Joe'), and six grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E009313
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Aberdeen, Eoin (1924 - 1986)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-04-17
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007000-E007099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379252379252
Occupation Cardiac surgeon Thoracic surgeon Trauma surgeon
Details Eoin Aberdeen was born in Melbourne in 1924 and qualified in medicine there in 1948. Before coming to England in 1955 he was a medical and surgical registrar at the Royal Children's Hospital and a flying doctor in North-West Australia. After a spell in the burns unit at Birmingham he became surgical registrar in the thoracic unit at Great Ormond Street having passed his FRCS in 1956. He returned to Melbourne to continue his paediatric surgical training but soon returned to the Hospital for Sick Children in London as senior registrar in the thoracic unit. After a year in the United States with Dr Frank Gerbode at Stanford University he returned to Great Ormond Street where, in 1963, he was appointed consultant thoracic surgeon. His work there concentrated on open-heart surgery in infants and small children. He was a perfectionist; each case was meticulously investigated preoperatively, complete and detailed records of all procedures were made and he concentrated on achieving a high standard of postoperative care. His work, especially on transposition of the great arteries, brought him international fame. In 1971, at the height of his success, he left Great Ormond Street for the United States where he felt he would have better opportunity to pursue his interests in measurement and documentation, in particular in the management of complex congenital cardiac anomalies. He was first, chief of cardiac surgery at the Children's Hospital, Philadelphia, from 1971 to 1974, then in similar posts at Mount Sinai Hospital, New York (1974-76) and the Children's Hospital, Newark (1976-78). When he resigned his post at Newark he decided to quit cardiac surgery altogether and in 1980 took a post as emergency-room physician at the Medical Center at Syracuse University. His failure in the USA was partly self-inflicted. He was a highly intelligent man with an almost encyclopaedic grasp of paediatric and cardiac surgery. By means of computerised data storage and retrieval he had built up an unrivalled collection of relevant articles, each carefully annotated. His readiness to compare results of surgical treatment did not always make him friends but he never spared himself criticism. In 1983 he was stricken by severe illness which added to his troubles but he bore all with courage, resignation and humour. He died on 24 March 1986 aged 62. He was supported throughout by his wife, Virginia who survived him together with their two daughters and one son.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007069
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Pierre, Sir Joseph Henry (1904 - 1984)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-07-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007500-E007599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379763379763
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Henry Pierre was born in Trinidad in 1904 and received his early education at Queen's Royal College and his subsequent medical training at St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School, where he qualified MB BS in 1931. The following year he returned to Trinidad and joined the medical service there. In 1945 he was appointed surgeon to the General Hospital in San Fernando, and in 1950 consultant surgeon to the General Hospital in Port of Spain. He pioneered the introduction of thoracic surgery to Trinidad. He became a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1939. He was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England in 1959. He was also elected a member of the International College of Surgeons and was awarded the Navy Meritorious Public Health Citation by the United States Government. He was knighted in 1957 for his services to Trinidad, and received the Chaconia Medal of Trinidad in 1976. Henry Pierre loved surgery, and had large hands and a gentle touch which allayed the fears of the most apprehensive patients, particularly children. It is not known when he married but he and his wife, Marjorie, had two sons, one of whom was adopted. He retired to England and died at Bray, Maidenhead, on 28 December 1984 at the age of 80.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007580
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Reid, Hugh (1893 - 1971)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-10-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006000-E006099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378242378242
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Hugh Reid was born, one of twins, in Bebington, Cheshire, on 19 January 1893, the son of a forwarding agent. The family soon moved to Lancashire and Hugh went to Merchant Taylor's School, Crosby. His studies at the Liverpool Medical School were interrupted by the first world war and he served as a Surgeon Probationer in a destroyer. During the latter part of his time in the Navy, when stationed in Liverpool, he gave lecture demonstrations in anatomy in the Medical School. It is said that he rode up Brownlow Hill on horseback, in naval uniform and cloak, and tied his horse to the railings of the Medical School. After resuming his studies he qualified in the London Conjoint examination in 1919 and the Liverpool MB ChB, in 1920. He obtained the FRCS in 1921. He was appointed as honorary assistant surgeon to the David Lewis Northern Hospital in 1923, and two years later moved to the Royal Infirmary. At one time he had considered a career in gynaecology but his new appointment committed him to general surgery. His many anecdotes about Frank Jeans and Robert Kelly, with whom he worked, were colourful and entertaining. He had a great admiration for the German school of surgery, and visited Sauerbruch several times. Together with Moriston Davies and others, he was a founder member of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, subsequently becoming President of the Society. He was one of the first surgeons, if not the first, to perform a pneumonectomy in the North of England. In 1928 he was appointed honorary thoracic surgeon to the North Wales Sanatorium. He was also interested in the surgery of malignant disease, and in 1940 was appointed honorary surgeon to the Liverpool Radium Institute. Other appointments included honorary surgeon to the Liverpool Homoeopathic Hospital and to the Chest Unit at Broadgreen Hospital. He became interested in the surgery of the thymus in myasthenia gravis and in 1945 was awarded the degree of Doctor of Medicine at Liverpool for his work in this field. He was a member of the Court of Examiners from 1958 to 1964. His ward rounds, for which he always wore an elegantly waisted double breasted white coat and a monocle, were occasions that many of his students and associates will always remember. During the second world war a close friendship developed between Hugh Reid and Dean Dwelly at Liverpool Cathedral. Hugh became a firewatcher and took up residence in the Cathedral. He was deeply steeped in the scriptures and loved the liturgy of the Established Church. As recreation he enjoyed shooting, skiing and climbing in the Alps. In 1943 he married Sheila Carmichael, herself a doctor. They lived at the Old Rectory, Ruthin, where they had three daughters one of whom became a dental surgeon. After his retirement he frequently preached at Llanbedr Parish Church where he was a lay reader. Hugh Reid died aged 78 on 9 March, 1971.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006059
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching MacMahon, John Stephen ( - 1968)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-09-11
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005900-E005999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378097378097
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details John Stephen MacMahon was born at Cootamundra, New South Wales. His father was a solicitor practising there, but he also had a country property where the animals, the horses especially, fascinated the boy. He was educated at St Patrick's College, Goulburn, and from the very outset had an outstanding scholastic record. In spite of the advice of his father and his teachers to go on to the university he preferred to work on the land, but after two years his father died and he then decided to follow his wishes and so started to study law at Sydney University. He soon gave that up and turned to medicine, and these early hesitations are worthy of record in view of the brilliance of his subsequent career in surgery. MacMahon was among the first clinical students to work at St Vincent's Hospital, but after graduating MB ChM with first class honours in 1926 he became a junior resident at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney, with which he was closely associated for the rest of his life. He had become assistant medical superintendent by 1932 when he was given leave to come to England. He was the first Australian to win the Hallett Prize at the Primary Fellowship that year, and in December 1932 he passed the Final Examination. While in London he was a clinical assistant at St Mark's Hospital and also at St Peter's, and he then proceeded to Vienna to study Bohler's treatment of fractures, and also visited Finsterer's clinic. On his return to Sydney in 1933 he resumed his duties at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, had plenty of opportunity to practise the techniques he had seen while abroad, especially in the treatment of fractures, and was admitted to the Fellowship of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. In 1937 he was appointed Syme Scholar, and in 1946 he became honorary surgeon to the hospital, a post which he held with distinction till he reached retirement age in 1959 and was then made honorary consulting surgeon. In the later part of his career he specialized in thoracic surgery and for that he will long be remembered in Sydney. He married in 1948 Marie Fagan and thus began a family life which was his chief joy ever afterwards. They had three sons and a daughter, and John, who had been an enthusiastic footballer at school took great delight in watching his children at play. At first acquaintance many found him rather brusque and stand-offish, but on coming to know him better the kindly and more friendly side of his nature became apparent, and it was no doubt the family influence which mellowed him in his later years. He died suddenly, while still fully active in clinical and administrative affairs, on 23 January 1968, to the great distress of his family and friends.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005914
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fatti, Libero (1901 - 1981)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-12-01
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006400-E006499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378668378668
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Libero Fatti was born on 13 January 1901 in Johannesburg of Italian parents, Luigi and Eliza Fatti, pioneers who had come from Sansepolcro, a small town in Tuscany, in 1896. He was educated until 1915 at the German school in Johannesburg and then at St John's College. After matriculating he started his medical training at the School of Mines in Johannesburg, but after one year he sailed to England to continue at University College and University College Hospital. As a student he spoke German, French and Italian fluently and he spent his vacations in Europe becoming an expert skier - a sport he continued to enjoy well into his seventies. On qualification in 1925 he did the round of house jobs at University College Hospital, where he was fortunate to work under Wilfred Trotter. He later formed an abiding friendship with Ivor Lewis and it was largely the influence of these two master surgeons which made him adopt thoracic surgery as his life's work. In 1934 he was appointed general surgeon to Hillingdon Hospital where he started his thoracic surgery. He pursued this at the Brompton under J E H Roberts, Tudor Edwards and Clement Price-Thomas and then spent six months with Evarts Graham in St Louis, USA. He was then appointed surgeon to the new Harefield Chest Hospital whilst still keeping his post at Hillingdon. He had become a most experienced surgeon and elegant craftsman, and at this time was amongst the first to perfect the dissection technique of pulmonary resection. He was also a master of the difficult thoracoplasty of Semb. During the war years he became acquainted with Lady Florey, the co-discoverer of penicillin, and with her he developed methods of treating pleural infections which remain valid to this day. In 1948 he returned to South Africa being appointed the first thoracic surgeon in Johannesburg, at the General Hospital as well as at Baragwanath. With his usual enthusiasm and devotion he built up a department which attracted many young surgeons. He was the father of thoracic surgery in South Africa and in 1948 performed the first indirect heart operation. The emotional and physical stresses involved resulted in a coronary thrombosis in 1949 from which he made a complete recovery. He continued working until 1968. On retirement to his farm he indulged in his hobbies of sailing, carpentry and fruit growing with the same boundless energy he had displayed when in practice. He had a passion for travel and visited Red China, Indonesia, Australasia and the Galapagos Islands. He was the gentlest of men, with infinite enthusiasm and sparkling charm. He was blessed with a happy marriage to Mavis Havemann in 1940, they had three sons and a daughter. He died on 29 March 1981.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006485
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Santy, Paul (1887 - 1970)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-10-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006000-E006099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378258378258
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Paul Santy, Professor of Clinical Surgery 1941-58 in the University of Lyon, Surgeon to the Edward Herriot Hospital 1933-58, and Director of the Lyon Anti-Cancer Centre, was a superb technical surgeon and an adventurous experimentalist of indefatigable curiosity, ever seeking advances for surgery through scientific research in the Hunterian tradition. At the biennial congresses of the International Society of Surgery from 1920 onwards his lectures drew a maximum audience; he was elected an Honorary Member of the Society in 1961. Sir Stanford Cade made the citation in his honour when he was formally admitted to Honorary Fellowship of the College on 14 July, the French national festival day, 1970, following his election by Council in the previous January. Santy was born on 16 April 1887, graduated at Lyon, where he was a pupil of Xavier Delore, in 1918, and was prosector of anatomy under Antoine Poncet at the Hôtel-Dieu in 1912. He was on active service as a battalion medical officer with the French Army from the beginning of the German invasion in August 1914, till he was called to the teaching centre for war surgery at Bouleuse under Claude Regaud and Rene Leriche; he won the Croix-de-Guerre for his services. After the war he returned to Lyon and was appointed Chef de Clinique to Leon Berard in 1923, becoming Chef de Service in 1927. He obtained his own clinic in Pavillon O at the Hôpital Edouard Herriot in 1933. Thenceforward the record of his achievement became a roll-call of pioneer advances in French surgery, particularly thoracic surgery. He was elected Professor of Operative Surgery in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Lyon in 1939 and Professor of Clinical Surgery in 1941, and continued actively at work throughout the German occupation. He contributed with Alain Mouchet an influential report on the surgical treatment of cancer of the oesophagus to the fiftieth Congress of the French Association of Surgery in 1947, and after a visit to the United States in that year he introduced cardiac surgery to France in 1948, at first following the new American techniques, but soon developing his own modifications with great success. He was also a simple and luminous teacher, whose 'journées chirurgicales' were eagerly attended, and he introduced the system of entrusting small groups of students to instruction by his young assistants. Santy's strong but sensitive character, his neat appearance and debonnaire bearing made him a centre of attraction for students and colleagues. He was active in many professional societies, locally, nationally and internationally, notably in the Société Française de Chirurgie Thoracique, of which he was a founder and its President in 1950. He received many honours including the Médaille de la Santé publique, and was an Officer of the Academy and an Officer of the Legion of Honour. He retired in 1958 and died on 20 January 1970 aged eighty-three.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006075
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sabiston, David Coston (1924 - 2009)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by William C Meyers
Publication Date 2012-09-07 2013-12-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E002000-E002999/E002800-E002899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/375036375036
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details David Coston Sabiston was a distinguished American surgeon. As chairman of the department of surgery at Duke University School of Medicine, North Carolina, he was, reputedly, one of the greatest surgeons who ever lived. In 1962, he grafted a vein from a patient's leg to feed blood past a blocked coronary artery, the very first coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG), and promptly became known as a moderniser of cardiac surgery. He was president of virtually all the principal surgical societies in the United States, including the American College of Surgeons, the Association for Academic Surgery, the Society of University Surgeons, the American Surgical Association, the Southern Surgical Association, the American Association for Thoracic Surgery…the list goes on. At the same time, he was kind and generous, a family man revered by his children, grandchildren and colleagues. Yet, to his surgical residents-in-training, he always remained an incredibly tough taskmaster, who would continuously strike fear in their hearts. Love, hate, productivity and camaraderie were the ingredients for his recipe for nurturing young surgical leaders in his training environment at Duke University. Sabiston was born on 4 October 1924 to David C Sabiston senior and Frances Marie Sabiston née Jackson in Jacksonville, North Carolina, USA. He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill at the age of 19 and went on to medical school at Johns Hopkins, qualifying in 1947. For the next two years the US Army Medical Corps posted Sabiston to the Walter Reed Medical Center, where as a captain he performed cardiovascular research. After military service, Sabiston returned to Hopkins for his residency under the great Alfred Blalock, who had succeeded Halsted at America's premier surgery training institution. In 1953, Sabiston became an assistant professor, Howard Hughes scholar, and, as the story goes, Blalock's choice to succeed him as chairman. The latter did not happen. In 1961, Sabiston took a Fulbright scholarship to the Nuffield department of surgery at Oxford. On his return to the US in 1964, Sabiston became James B Duke professor and chairman of the department of surgery at Duke University School of Medicine in Durham, North Carolina. He held that position for the next 32 years, published almost 300 peer-reviewed papers, over 35 books, and many invited book chapters and editorials. One of those works *Sabiston's textbook of surgery: the biological basis of modern surgical practice* (Philadelphia PA, Saunders), is now in its 19th edition and is still considered the definitive treatise on surgical practice. At Duke, Sabiston desegregated and reorganised the surgical clinics and made Duke the place to go for surgical care in the South. He produced 138 surgical chairmen or division chiefs. He cultivated a happy, emboldening surgical environment, with an emphasis on basic science research, and he actively encouraged residents and faculty to bring basic science research to the bedside. Many modern discoveries and procedures originated at Duke under Sabiston. These included ablation of atrial arrhythmias, parathyroid auto-transplantation, transgender surgery, many liver resection techniques and minimally invasive surgical procedures, HLA (human leukocyte antigen) and other immunologic discoveries. Sabiston's environment fostered the famous paper on laparoscopic cholecystectomy published in 1991 in the *New England Journal of Medicine*, which triggered the world's first formal training programme in minimally invasive surgery ('A prospective analysis of 1518 laparoscopic cholecystectomies: the Southern Surgeons Club' *N Eng J Med* 1991 Apr 18;324[16]:1073-8). Sabiston's premier surgical training programme preserved the Halsted/Blalock/Hopkins tradition and became known, to the rest of the world, as 'The Decade with Dave'. Some of that label was myth, which the residents loved to perpetuate. Most residents spent only eight years in the programme, including two years of basic science research. Although most rotations were every-other-night call, the residents looked out for each other and were allowed three full days off every other week. The residents referred to Sabiston as 'The Man' or 'TM' for short. A 'positive TM sign' meant Sabiston's Cadillac was in his parking space and everyone had to be on their toes. TM had a passion for detail, cleanliness and formality. Anyone found in scrub clothes outside of the operating room suites flirted with expulsion. Once, the chief resident, who had invented the world's first artificial heart, was sent home to change out of his casual trousers. Sabiston assumed numerous other leadership roles throughout his career. He served as editor-in-chief of the leading surgical journal *Annals of Surgery* for 27 years. He also received many awards, honorary degrees, fellowships and memberships of professional societies across the world, including of the International Society of Surgery, the Royal College of Surgeons of England, the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, and surgical associations in Germany, France, Japan, the Philippines, Argentina, Brazil, Spain and Colombia. Sabiston retired from medical practice in 1994. He died from a stroke on 26 January 2009 at the age of 84. He was survived by his wife of 54 years, Agnes née Barden, their three daughters, Anne Leggett, Agnes Butler and Sarah Sabiston, and five grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E002853
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Shepherd, Mary Patricia (1933 - 2003)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-01-19 2007-02-09
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372372372372
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Mary Shepherd was a former consultant thoracic surgeon at Harefield Hospital, Middlesex. She was born at Forest Hill, London, on 4 July 1933, the youngest of the two children of George Raymond Shepherd, an electrical and mechanical engineer, and Florence May Savile, whose father and grandfather had been general practitioners in Harrogate. She spent a year in school in Maryland when her father’s professional work took the family there, and this experience gave her a lifelong interest in the United States, to which she frequently travelled throughout her life. In 1946 she won a scholarship to James Allen’s Girls School, did well there, and had no difficulty gaining a place at the Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine, where she again won several prizes, notably in surgery, which was always her first interest, and she qualified in 1957. After house jobs and a registrar appointment in surgery at the Royal Free, and passing her Edinburgh fellowship, she became a registrar at Harefield Hospital, where she spent the rest of her professional life, becoming a senior registrar and then consultant. She enjoyed a valuable year at the Toronto Children’s Hospital from 1966 to 1967, where she worked with Mustard, becoming a joint author of papers on membrane oxygenation and the diaphragmatic pedicle graft, later the subject of a Hunterian Professorship (1969) and her thesis for the MS London. Her professional contributions were considerable, with the publication of many papers, of which that on plombage (*Thorax* 1985) is perhaps the most influential. She maintained a characteristic style, with her striking appearance in theatre garb, her white Jaguar, and occasional performances on the piano accordion at social events. Her wide interests were exemplified by her service on the board of visitors at Wormwood Scrubs prison, and her decision to retire at 52. She had a home in Southwold, where she had always spent much of her free time through a lifelong friendship. Thereafter she divided her time between Suffolk and Cape Cod, United States, pursuing her interest in antiques. Her active life was ended when she developed cancer of the thyroid, with which she coped with characteristic fortitude. She died on 20 October 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000185
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Aylwin, John Angus (1917 - 1968)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-07-14
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005600-E005699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377808377808
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details John Angus Aylwin was born in Leeds, the son of Ernest Angus Aylwin, an engineer, who married a Miss Bates, but John was the only man in the family to take up medicine. He was educated at the Leeds Grammar School and in medicine at Leeds University, where he qualified MB ChB in 1940. He became a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1948. In 1943 he married Margaret Gibson, daughter of Sir Granville Gibson MP. There were three sons of this marriage, but none of them took up a medical career. He received a sound surgical training in the Moynihan tradition from Digby Chamberlain and George Armitage, for whom he was house surgeon, and he subsequently worked as medical officer at the Warde-Aldam Hospital, South Almsall in Yorkshire, where he undertook a considerable amount of general surgery and also became acquainted with the many complicated injuries that occur in a coal-mining area. Like his teachers he was a precise, careful and gentle surgeon. After serving for some years as registrar with P R Allison at the General Infirmary at Leeds he became dedicated to thoracic surgery, and when P R Allison moved to Oxford he was appointed to the Leeds staff as a thoracic surgeon, junior to Geoffrey Wooler; he concentrated chiefly on pulmonary and oesophageal surgery, and did very valuable work in this field. During the war he was a Surgeon-Lieutenant RNVR from 1942 to 1946. He was a man of great courage and determination. On 25 August 1958, while bathing in Jersey, he saved a man from drowning and was presented with the Carnegie Hero Award. In 1946, after only ten years on the active staff of the Hospital, he suffered a severe and catastrophic cerebral haemorrhage from the basilar artery. It was thought very unlikely that he would ever recover from this, but after many weeks of unconsciousness, with a trachaeostomy and tube feeding, he gradually recovered and with characteristic courage chose to ignore the event and return to active surgical practice. He died in Jersey whither he had retired on 8 June 1968 at the age of 51. Publications: Oesophageal Atresia. *British Surg Progress* 1956. Avoidable vascular spread in resections for Bronchial Carcinoma. *Thorax* 1951, 6, 250-267.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005625
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Patel, Chunnibhai Shankerbhai (1905 - 1968)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Monk, Ian Maxim (1916 - 1978)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-02-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006700-E006799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378945378945
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Ian Maxim Monk was the son of a musician who had been director of violin studies at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. After education at Sydney Church of England Grammar School he graduated from Sydney University in 1940. He was resident medical officer at St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney, and then served in the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps during the second world war. He was demobilized as a surgical specialist with the rank of Major and took the Sydney mastership in surgery. He foresaw the need for thoracic surgeons in Australia and began his training with John Haywood at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He received the Gordon Craig and Nuffield Travelling Fellowship which enabled him to come to England where he was appointed RSO at the Brompton Hospital in 1947 and came under the influence of Russell (later Lord) Brock. He took the FRCS in the following year and returned to Sydney in 1950 when he was appointed thoracic surgeon to the Royal North Shore Hospital. Having embarked on thoracic surgery before the beginnings of open cardiac surgery Ian Monk, like many of his generation, had to learn things the hard way and grow with the specialty. He undertook animal work at the Veterinary School in Prospect, New South Wales, and made frequent visits to cardiac centres abroad to return home with much information. He was a regular contributor at meetings of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and wrote a number of papers which were characterised by commonsense and sound judgement. He was warden of the clinical school at Royal North Shore Hospital and was dedicated to student teaching. In November 1976 he became the third President of the Asian Pacific Society of Cardiothoracic Surgeons. There is no record of the date of his marriage to his wife Judith, by whom he had three daughters. He had inherited a love of music from his father and was an accomplished pianist. He was keen on sailing and was also an enthusiastic skier. After an earlier myocardial infarction he died suddenly on 31 July 1978, on his skis, while waiting for a chair lift in the Snowy Mountains, and was survived by his wife and daughters.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006762
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jackson, Charles Anthony (1912 - 1995)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-09-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008000-E008099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380207380207
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Charles Anthony Jackson, 'Tony' to his close friends but always known at Harefield Hospital as 'CA' to distinguish him from his colleague and namesake 'JW', was born in Golders Green on 22 April 1912. His father, Archibald Jackson, was an electrical engineer and his mother was Helen, née O'Callaghan. His early education was at St Joseph's Convent, Streatham, followed by Haberdashers Aske's School, London, from which he went to St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School and graduated in 1939. He served as surgeon lieutenant in the RNVR during the second world war and was captured at the fall of Hong Kong on Christmas Day, 1941. He spent the rest of the war in camps in Japan, survived being torpedoed in transit, and was in charge of the POW 'hospital' at Ichioka. His experiences as a Japanese prisoner of war affected him profoundly and influenced his attitude to the human condition for the rest of his life. Personal hardship and improvised surgery without anaesthesia were all part of his lot at that time. He was awarded the MBE in recognition of the efforts he made on behalf of his fellow prisoners. After the war he completed his training as a thoracic surgeon, became first assistant on the thoracic unit at St Bartholomew's and went on to consultant appointments at St Alban's City Hospital, Colindale, Harefield and St Charles's Hospital, and was honorary thoracic surgeon to St Andrew's Hospital, Dollis Hill. As a surgeon his humanitarian approach was manifested in his attention to the spiritual as well as the physical welfare of his patients - the latter finding expression in his famously small thoracotomy wounds. His Roman Catholic faith sustained him throughout a prolonged saga of personal illness and disability, with surgery for carcinoma of the stomach and a malignant leg ulcer, operations on both hips, and surgery and radiotherapy for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, which finally recurred. In retirement he travelled widely, spending time with his children and grandchildren, and became a wine connoisseur and gourmet cook. He was survived by his Italian ex-wife, Maria Luisa, sons Christopher and John and daughters Teresa and Francesca, a physiotherapist, and five grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008024
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jackson, John Walter (1921 - 1985)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007300-E007399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379542379542
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details John Walter Jackson was born on 14 November 1921 at Ballyconnell, County Cavan, Ireland, the son of Reverend John Herbert Jackson, BD, a Canon of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, and Dora Grace (née Middleton). His early education was at Portora Royal School, Enniskillen, before he entered Trinity College, Dublin, for his medical studies. He qualified in 1945, having obtained the Haughton Clinical Prize and Medal in surgery. His early appointments in Dublin included serving as a house surgeon at Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital under Frederick Gill who subsequently became President of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. After further house appointments he came to London, working initially as resident surgical officer at the London Chest Hospital and later as assistant surgical officer to the County Hospital, Kingston-upon-Thames, under R H Franklin. He then spent four years at Central Middlesex Hospital, partly in general surgery under T G I James and partly in the neurosurgical unit. He passed the FRCS in 1950 and two years later was appointed registrar to the thoracic surgical unit at the Middlesex Hospital under Sir Thomas Holmes Sellors. He acquired the MCh degree in 1955 and was made chief assistant at Harefield Hospital, Middlesex, and promoted to consultant status as thoracic surgeon to Harefield Hospital, Windsor Group of Hospitals and the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, London, in 1959. He was specially interested in the techniques of a transthoracic approach to infective lesions of the spine, subluxations, tumours and prolapsed intervertebral discs and undertook much work on this subject at the Stanmore branch of the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital. The operative technique and results were presented at a Hunterian Lecture delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons on 11 June 1970. When the demand for surgical treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis lessened he continued to work on oesophageal and lung disease as well as performing cardiac surgery in its early days. His leisure interests were woodworking, gardening and walking. He married Dr Eileen Greenwood in 1953 and there were two daughters of the marriage, Jenny and Jane, the younger of whom has qualified in medicine, and one son, Adam. He died at his home in Cumbria on 6 July 1985, aged 63.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007359
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Edwards, Frederick Ronald (1910 - 1983)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007200-E007299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379426379426
Occupation Paediatric surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Frederick Ronald Edwards was born in Chester on 14 April 1910. He graduated with honours at the University of Liverpool in 1932, won the Samuels Memorial Scholarship in surgery, obtained the FRCS in 1934, the ChM in 1935 and the MD in 1938. His surgical training was in Wigan and Liverpool and he was influenced by Morriston Davies to enter thoracic surgery, working with Davies in the Merseyside regional thoracic service set up during the second world war, afterwards located at Broad Green Hospital. Later, with Professor J D Hay he founded and developed paediatric cardiac surgery at the Royal Liverpool Children's Hospital. He was lecturer and then director of studies in thoracic surgery in the University of Liverpool Medical School. He was twice Hunterian Professor RCS, in 1939 and 1944. He was President of the Liverpool Medical Institution in 1968, of the Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland in 1972 and of the Thoracic Society in 1967. He was at one time Chairman of the University Board of Clinical Studies and of the eastern district of the Liverpool Health Authority (Teaching). He made many contributions to surgical literature including his book Foundations of thoracic surgery. He had the reputation of being a master surgeon, dexterous, expeditious, dignified and quiet, an expert in the surgery of pulmonary tuberculosis, bronchiectasis, carcinoma of the bronchus and of the oesophagus, in mitral valve and congenital heart disease. He was loved and respected by all with whom he had contact and he always seemed to manage to give those with whom he worked a sense of being an important part of the team. His cheery "Thank you all" as he left the theatre was much appreciated by medical and nursing staff alike. He had a special fondness for Clwyd, North Wales, to which he retired in 1975. His wife, Joan, was also a medical graduate. They had four daughters and three sons, one becoming a surgeon and another a pathologist. With great fortitude he bore a long and painful illness and died 20 April 1983.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007243
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Mitchell, Robert Ian (1927 - 2002)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008700-E008799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380972380972
Occupation General practitioner Thoracic surgeon
Details Robert Mitchell was born in Longueville, New South Wales, on 13 October 1927. His father, William Robert Mitchell, was an accountant. His mother was Lilian née Coram. He was educated at the Sydney Church of England Grammar School and studied medicine at the University of Sydney. He did junior posts at the Royal North Shore Hospital, before going to Guy's in 1954 to specialise in surgery. After passing the FRCS, he was registrar at Oldchurch Hospital, Romford, and then resident surgical officer at St Mark's. He spent a year as a fellow at the Center for Cancer and Memorial Sloan Kettering Institute, New York, under George Pack. He then returned to the Royal North Shore Hospital in 1959 as lecturer in surgery. In 1960 he emigrated to Canada, as thoracic and general surgeon to the Wellesley Hospital. He remained there until 1983 as chief of thoracic surgery, but also held the position of associate professor in the department of surgery in the University of Toronto. During this period he held a consultant position at the King Faisal Specialist Hospital in Riyadh. In 1984, he became chairman of the board of trustees of the Eye Research Institute of Canada. He was also a director of George Weston Limited. He was executive director of the medical services division of the Workers Compensation Board of Ontario. A man of many interests, Bob Mitchell was a tireless campaigner against smoking, socialism and mediocrity. In 1978, he was the co-founder of a new political reform movement - One Canada. He was a keen swimmer, tennis-player, gardener and bird-watcher. He married Barbara Elizabeth née Weston in Cannes in 1957. They had two sons, Garfield and Mark, and four daughters, Eliza, Emma, Sarah and Serena, none of whom went into medicine. There are three grandchildren - Charlotte, Thomas and Wesley. He died on 13 February 2002. A new building for bird studies in Canada was established in his memory along one of the greatest migratory flyways in the world.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008789
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Gowar, Frederick John Sambrook (1910 - 1998)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Macarthur, Angus MacLeod (1921 - 2012)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by John Keates
Publication Date 2012-12-21 2014-01-22
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E003000-E003999/E003300-E003399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/375505375505
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Angus Macarthur was a consultant cardiothoracic surgeon at King's College Hospital, London. His life and career spanned vast changes in everyday life, the delivery of healthcare and the practice of surgery. He was born in Southampton on 3 January 1921. His father, Murdoch Macleod Macarthur, was brought up on Lewis in a seafaring community. He went to Glasgow and studied medicine for a year, but left to study marine engineering. He married Marion MacLeod Wyper, a staff nurse from Glasgow Royal Infirmary, and served in the Royal Navy during the First World War. Angus' older brother, Alastair, was born in 1917 and, after studying medicine at St Mary's in London, became a GP on the south coast. In 1923 the family emigrated to Southern Rhodesia to seek a more settled home life. Young Angus nearly did not complete the journey: he was scrambling halfway through an external porthole when his seven-year-old brother pulled him back. On reaching Southern Rhodesia, Angus attended Salisbury Catholic School. In 1929 his mother, who was much troubled with malaria, returned to England with the boys. Between 1930 and 1934 they attended Belmont School in Streatham, London, before returning to Southern Rhodesia. From 1934 to 1937, Angus attended the Prince Edward School in Salisbury, where he passed the matriculation exam. He returned to London and took his first MB exam at King's College. At the outbreak of the Second World War, Angus volunteered for the Royal Navy, but was told to complete his medical training. He initially went to Glasgow, but then joined King's College Hospital during the Blitz. He passed the conjoint examination in 1943 and served for six months at King's College Hospital as a house surgeon to Rear-Admiral Cecil Wakeley, whose surgical career extended back to the First World War. Angus then enrolled in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve (RNVR), serving two years as a surgeon lieutenant in a convoy destroyer, which included duties on the North Sea convoys to Russia. On one occasion he attended a seaman in a merchant ship who had caught his arm in a winch. The destroyer drew alongside, and he and his sick berth attendant were transferred by whaler across to the merchant ship, which was continuing in convoy. He anaesthetised the unfortunate seaman, amputated his arm, transfused one pint of blood and transferred him back to the destroyer, where the seaman continued his recovery. Angus was demobilised in 1946 and took his MB BS immediately. He continued his house appointments with six months of orthopaedic surgery, followed by a position as a registrar at the regional thoracic surgery unit, both at Horton Hospital in Epsom. This was a large wartime Emergency Medical Service hospital using the site of a London County asylum. In February 1948 he was appointed as a senior registrar at the Postgraduate Medical School of London at Hammersmith Hospital. He recalled his most influential trainers being Norman Barrett, Russell (Later Lord) Brock and Sir Clement Price Thomas. In January 1950, he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon to the regional unit, south west region, based at St Helier Hospital, Carshalton. From 1950 to 1952 he held the Dorothy Temple Cross travelling scholarship from the Medical Research Council to attend the cardiothoracic unit at Ann Arbor Hospital in Michigan, USA, and other leading American cardiac centres. Back at home, he sometimes travelled widely to incidents of major trauma. On one occasion he was summoned from St Helier Hospital to Eastbourne, some 40 miles away, following a railway accident. A steam train had run into another train at the station and one passenger had suffered a crushing injury with a left haemothorax, rupture of the diaphragm and avulsion of the spleen, which was floating in the chest cavity. The patient recovered following prompt control of the bleeding and a massive blood transfusion. In 1953 he was invited to Waterford, Ireland, for three months to start thoracic surgery in a new hospital. Routine thoracic surgery in those days often involved dealing with complications of longstanding tuberculosis. His first case as a consultant was one such example. A patient with a calcified tuberculous empyema developed massive haemoptysis. An emergency right pleuropneumonectomy was performed. The patient recovered and wrote to Angus two weeks later whilst convalescing in hospital expressing gratitude, not only for his recovery but also for the calm manner in which the operation was explained to him. Angus' work as a peripatetic thoracic surgeon to the south west region continued until 1962, when he was appointed as a consultant thoracic surgeon to King's College Hospital to join Bill Cleland, who had taken part in the first studies of cardiopulmonary bypass at the Hammersmith Hospital in the 1950s. Angus noted in his application that he had experience in all branches of thoracic surgery excepting cardiopulmonary bypass. At that time open cardiothoracic operations at King's consisted mainly of procedures to correct atrial-septal defects using profound hypothermia. The operations were performed on Mondays, with post-operative recovery taking place in a small side ward over several days, with a registrar staying in the ward until the patient was stabilised. Initial results were sometimes disappointing but, with the development of a perfusion service, Angus' experience in open heart surgery grew and he took on extra sessions at the Brook Hospital at Shooter's Hill to accommodate an increasing supply of patients from two busy cardiac centres. Naturally he continued with his general thoracic practice, and was much admired for his immaculate and delicate technique, enabling him to perform a transthoracic oesophagectomy, for example, in 90 minutes without any appearance of haste, without blood transfusion and with the patient being able to start mobilising on the following day. In 1971 he led a team which carried out an early lung transplant, in a man with terminal pulmonary failure due to cryptogenic fibrosing alveolitis ('Lung transplantation in a patient with fibrosing alveolitis' *BMJ* 1971 3 391). The operation was carried out with the help of extra-corporeal oxygenation and was followed by immune-suppression. There was a dramatic improvement in pulmonary function and the patient mobilised to the point of being discharged. Sadly, however, the patient died suddenly eight weeks after the operation following a severe haemoptysis from a bronchopulmonary fistula secondary to infection. The conclusion was that further operations of this sort must await more sophisticated techniques of immunological suppression and dedicated funding. The increase in workload following the further development of the cardiology services at King's and the large increase in the surgical treatment for coronary artery disease led to the appointment of another full-time cardiothoracic surgeon. In 1979 Angus was invited to assist starting cardio-thoracic surgery in a new unit in Kuwait. At King's in those days all the cardiothoracic operations were still carried out in one small operating theatre with no air conditioning, which opened directly on to another theatre on the main corridors of the original King's College Hospital, built in 1903. Very soon it was working to full capacity, and it was frustrating when managerial constraints were placed on the number of operations undertaken. On one occasion, in 1980, Angus felt obliged to comment in a letter to the *Times* on the serious implications to patients on the waiting list when the number of proposed operations in the last financial quarter were reduced by 75%. Eventually these problems were overcome with new facilities and he continued an active surgical career until his retirement in 1983. Angus was an athletic man who rowed for London University until the onset of the war. He was a lifelong enthusiastic swimmer and enjoyed sailing in Germany before demobilisation. He walked a great deal in Scotland, France and Switzerland. Later he took up long-distance cross country walking, on one occasion walking 100 miles in 48 hours. He was a quiet, private man. In 1947 he married Hilary Claire Parton, also a doctor. They had two children - Janet MacLeod and Duncan MacLeod. After he married he moved with his wife into a new house at Epsom, where they lived for 65 years until his death. Angus and his wife enjoyed the arts and regularly visited central London for concerts and exhibitions. In later life, when he had become house-bound, he took up knitting blankets for charity, which he said satisfied his Scots instinct to re-use old wool and continued to keep his hands busy. He regarded himself as fortunate that, by chance, he was 'taken up' into thoracic surgery 'a specialty not widely practised nor fully understood', for which there was a huge demand due to widespread tuberculous disease and, when this demand reduced with the arrival of chemotherapy, it was replaced with the new challenge of cardiac surgery, which kept him active until his retirement. He wished to be remembered for teaching a series of general surgical registrars, for it was not until later in his career that he was involved in a structured thoracic training programme. Many of these registrars became general surgical consultants and valued their experience in the management of chest trauma, including stab wounds of the heart and oesophagus, which were not uncommon in the local area. Some of them changed course and went on to a career in cardiothoracic surgery. His assistants remember him as a true gentleman, always calm, polite and supportive. As a surgeon he was skilled, unhurried and careful. As a mentor he was greatly valued. He will be remembered with affection by all. He died on 22 October 2012 at the age of 91.
Resource Identifier RCS: E003322
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cleland, William Paton (1912 - 2005)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372349372349
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Bill Cleland was a pioneering thoracic surgeon who helped develop open heart surgery in London in the 1950s. He was born in Sydney, New South Wales, on 30 May 1912, the son of Sir John Burton Cleland, professor of pathology at the University of Adelaide, and Dora Isabel Robson. He was proud to be the 26th head of his ancient Scottish family who were kinsmen of William Wallace. He was educated at Scotch College, Adelaide, and Adelaide University, where he qualified in 1934. He then completed two years as house physician and house surgeon at the Royal Adelaide and the Adelaide Children’s Hospital. He went to England, to King’s College Hospital, in 1938 to be a resident medical officer and passed the MRCP. With the outbreak of war he was evacuated with King’s to Horton, Surrey, where he was busy in the Emergency Medical Service dealing with wartime injuries. This generated an interest in surgery: he quickly passed the FRCS and then went on in 1948 to the Brompton Hospital as house physician and resident medical officer, where he was influenced by Russell Brock, Tudor Edwards and Price Thomas. He soon specialised in chest surgery, moving gradually on into cardiac surgery. He was appointed consultant thoracic surgeon at King’s College Hospital and the Brompton in 1948, and the following year as a lecturer at the Hammersmith, where he worked with Denis Melrose on the prototype heart-lung machine with which he performed the first successful open-heart operation in Britain in 1953. He was a pioneer in the subsequent development of cardiac by-pass surgery, which he described in a classic paper in *Thorax* in 1983. He wrote more than 70 papers, and was much sought after abroad, setting up cardiothoracic units in Russia, Egypt, Iraq, Syria and Iceland. He was consultant adviser in thoracic surgery to the Department of Health and the Royal Navy. He married Norah Goodhart in 1940 who predeceased him. They had two sons and a daughter. In retirement he continued to follow up his old patients, and enjoy his hobbies of fishing, the opera, gardening and beekeeping. A strongly built man, he became somewhat frail in old age, and died peacefully at home in Goodworth Clatford, Hampshire, on 29 March 2005, just before his 93rd birthday.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000162
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Ackland, Thomas Henry (1908 - 1994)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-07-06 2012-07-19
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372190372190
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Thomas Ackland was a general surgeon in Melbourne who introduced mammography into Australia. He was born in Melbourne on 8 September 1908, the son of William Ackland, an engineer, and Blanche Glana née Rye, the daughter of a veterinary surgeon. He was educated at Spring Road State School and then won an entrance scholarship to Melbourne Grammar School in 1921. He held prizes in English, French, Latin, Greek, Greek and Roman history, scripture and map drawing. He was dux of the school, and held university exhibitions in Greek, and in Greek and Roman history. He went on to Melbourne University, where he held exhibitions in anatomy, physiology, pathology, bacteriology, surgery, and in obstetrics and gynaecology, and gained first class honours. He proceeded to train at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He subsequently went to the UK, where he studied at St Bartholomew's Hospital, gained his FRCS, and was a resident surgical officer at St Mark's Hospital, with Milligan, Morgan, Gabriel and Lloyd Davies. During the second world war he served with the 4th, 116th and 121st Australian General Hospitals, in the Middle East, New Guinea and Australia. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. After the war, he was appointed to the honorary staff of the Royal Melbourne Hospital, which he served from 1948 to 1968. He also held the positions of consulting surgeon to the Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital (from 1946 to 1973) and to the Peter MacCallum Cancer Institute (1955 to 1968). He served on the Anti-Cancer Council of Victoria from 1955 to 1981, and was the founder of its public education committee. In his early career he had an interest in surgery of the large bowel, and made major contributions to the understanding of the pathology and treatment of strangulated haemorrhoids. He later took an interest in breast disease. After his appointment as Robert Fowler travelling fellow in clinical cancer research in 1961 he introduced mammography into Australia, and pioneered adjuvant chemotherapy in the treatment of breast cancer. In 1940 he married Joan Rowell, a writer and literary critic and the daughter of John Rowell, an artist. They had one daughter, Judy, and two sons, Peter and Michael. He read voraciously, enjoyed music and played the violin in the Zelman Memorial Orchestra. He painted and also enjoyed boating and fishing. He died on 12 October 1994.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000003
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Belcher, John Rashleigh (1917 - 2006)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2007-07-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000300-E000399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372558372558
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details John Rashleigh Belcher was a thoracic surgeon at the Middlesex Hospital, London. Born in Liverpool on 11 January 1917, he was the ninth in a long line of doctors who originally hailed from Bandon in Cork. He was educated at Epsom and St Thomas’ Hospital, where he graduated at the age of 21, having asked for an early viva. At the outbreak of war St Thomas’ was evacuated to Farnham and there he met his wife, Jacqueline Phillips. It was a watershed time in medicine: on one side of the ward leeches were being applied and on the other an early sulphonamide drug (M&B 693) was being prescribed. He joined the RAFVR as soon as possible and was posted to Cottesmore. He became FRCS in 1942 and was posted to Canada. On his return he went to RAF Wroughton, where he gained huge experience from D-day casualties. After demobilisation, he returned to St Thomas’ as resident assistant surgeon, before becoming interested in thoracic surgery. He worked at the Brompton in 1947 and became senior registrar at the London Chest and Middlesex hospitals. In 1951 he was appointed to the North West Thames region as a thoracic surgeon, a post which included the London Chest Hospital and places as far afield as Arlesey, Pinewood and Harefield. He was appointed consultant thoracic surgeon to the Middlesex Hospital in 1955. He promoted lobectomy for lung cancer at a time when the conventional wisdom, endorsed by Tudor Edwards, was that nothing short of pneumonectomy was of any use, and he published on the treatment of emphysematous cysts. He performed over 1,000 closed mitral valvotomies, even as fourth operations, and reported on these. He was Hunterian lecturer in 1979. Unfortunately his reputation in this field was less widely acknowledged than his expertise in ‘lung volume reduction surgery’. He was a kind, supportive and tolerant boss who was always ready to praise. He was president of the Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland in 1980. He travelled extensively with the British Council and set up cardiothoracic units abroad. A devoted family man, he had wide musical tastes, was a compulsive gardener and an accomplished artist and photographer. Jacqueline died in 2006 and he died on 12 January 2006, leaving a daughter and two sons.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000372
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Eerland, Leendert Daniel (1897 - 1977)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-12-01
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006500-E006599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378684378684
Occupation General surgeon Obstetrician and gynaecologist Thoracic surgeon
Details Born in Rotterdam on 25 February 1897, the son of a teacher who moved to the Dutch East Indies in 1905, Eerland spent part of his childhood in what is now Indonesia, a land for which he retained a life-long affection. He received his professional education at the faculty of medicine in Utrecht from 1916 to 1921 and decided to specialise in surgery and gynaecology. His thesis in 1926 was *Mola hydatidosa, mola destruens and chorionepithelioma*. In 1926 he went back to the East Indies and spent the next two years in the department of surgery of the Medical Faculty of Batavia, and from 1928 to 1937 he was surgeon and medical director at the Hospital of the Handelsvereeniging Amsterdam in Paree (Kediri), East Java. Although he spent much time on obstetrics and was interested in leprosy, pulmonary tuberculosis and tumours, his main contribution was his intensive study of endemic goitre, which had reached such proportions in the East Indies that sculptors depicted their gods and heroes with enormous swellings in the neck as a sign of prestige and greatness. It is mainly due to Eerland's work that Indonesia is now comparatively free from this disorder. He returned to the Netherlands in 1937 on election to the Chair of General Surgery at the University of Groningen. Although he always remained a general surgeon he became expert in the field of thoracic surgery: his pioneer work in lung surgery and his postgraduate courses attracted surgeons from all parts of the world and more than twenty nationalities were often represented at a course. Besides being a great teacher he was a brilliant technical surgeon and had remarkable success as a pioneer in lung resection for pulmonary tuberculosis. He also led the way in cardiac and pancreatic surgery, and was for many years Dean of the Faculty of Medicine in Groningen. He is remembered as an eminent surgeon, a fine organiser and administrator and a man of style, self discipline and dry humour. After his retirement he wrote an autobiography entitled 'The scalpel and the candle' the candle in the title referring to his motto: *In serviendo consumer* - In serving I am consumed.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006501
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bradmore, Herbert Michael (1917 - 1998)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008400-E008499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380676380676
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Herbert Michael Bradmore was a consultant thoracic surgeon at St Mary's Hospital, Portsmouth. He was born in Wokingham, Berkshire, on 26 April 1917. His father, Herbert Ernest, came from Rhodesia, where he had business interests. His mother, Emily Jane Brownlie, was the granddaughter of the Keeper of the Regalia in Edinburgh Castle and she herself was born in the castle. Business affairs took the family to Edinburgh, where Michael went to a dames' school. Later the family returned to Rhodesia and he attended Michael House School in South Africa, and then later, when the family returned to Edinburgh, the Royal High School. He gained a place at the medical school at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, but his student career was interrupted by a spell of nine months in a sanatorium for tuberculosis. He did well, returned to his studies and qualified in 1942. His future wife, Rosemary Robinson, had been his exact contemporary at medical school and qualified in the same year. She originally came from Rhodesia, where her father was manager of the prestigious Meikles Hotel in Salisbury. She was particularly interested in paediatrics and later, when they were in Portsmouth, did fine work in Gosport. They were married in 1943. Disqualified from military service because of his history of tuberculosis, Michael completed a series of junior appointments, passing his FRCS Edinburgh in 1946 and FRCS England in 1948. An appointment as first assistant at the London Chest Hospital led him into that speciality, and he was appointed consultant in thoracic surgery at St Mary's Hospital, Portsmouth, in 1954. For a time he also did some sessions in Southampton. Through the course of their professional careers, Michael and Rosemary enjoyed a happy family life bringing up their two sons. After retirement in 1982 they were able to travel together, particularly enjoying visits to Mexico and Egypt. Michael's interests were wide and unusual. He was a keen bibliophile and enjoyed music and chess. He was a good linguist and mastered both Spanish and Russian. He was particularly interested in the history of warfare and was an enthusiast of muzzle-loading guns. He died of a heart attack in the Queen Alexandra Hospital, Portsmouth, on 16 August 1998. His wife and two sons survived him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008493
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Sandor, Francis Ferenc (1905 - 1994)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-01
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008300-E008399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380500380500
Occupation General practitioner General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Francis Sandor was born in Budapest on 13 July 1905. His father, Ignac, was a businessman in Budapest and his mother, Jenni Cipszer, was a teacher. He left Hungary with the advent of Communism and went back to medical school in Edinburgh and re-qualified as LRFPS (Glasgow) in 1952. He originally trained in medicine in Budapest with an MD in 1930 and a diploma in operative surgery in 1932, and then studied in Paris. He was at first chief of surgery at the Cancer Hospital and at St Rokus Hospital, Budapest. After he left Hungary in 1950 he initially trained in Glasgow and Edinburgh and ultimately settled in Hartlepool as an assistant surgeon. After twenty years of surgery in Britain he retired to go on to do another ten years as a general practitioner in Hartlepool, at the same time continuing his research into thoracic trauma in the department of surgery at Newcastle University. Sandor was a man of great enthusiasm. He spoke four European languages fluently and was competent in even more. He had a composite understanding of Latin and Greek and was a classical scholar of note. He was a dedicated skier until the age of 78. He was a great music lover and played the violin. As a young man he went to all the concerts around the North East and would be regularly met there, listening particularly to string quartets. At heart a musician, his love and understanding of music was unsurpassed. His particular clinical interest in later life was the effect of major trauma on intra-thoracic organs, and he published articles on traumatic mediastinal haematoma in both English and German language publications. He married Mimi Garai, a dietician, in 1940 and they had three sons. The first, Stephen Mathew, became a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist in Portland, Oregon; the second, Peter Ivan, became an analytical chemist in Newcastle-upon- Tyne and the third, George Gabor, became a Professor of Paediatric Cardiology at the University of British Columbia. He was credited with an ascent to the top of the medical profession in both Hungary and England after he decided to flee to the West. He died on 23 February 1994, survived by his wife and family.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008317
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Bickford, Bertram John (1913 - 2001)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-16
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008400-E008499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380653380653
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Bertram John Bickford was a consultant surgeon in Liverpool. He was born in Tavistock, Devon, on 17 October 1913, and was to become the third generation of his family to enter medicine. His grandfather, Thomas Leaman Bickford, was a Surgeon Captain RN. His father, Bertram Raleigh Bickford, was a GP and also a former Surgeon Captain RN. His mother was Bertrude Annie Reid, née Camozzi. Bickford was educated at Epsom College and went to Bart's with a scholarship. There he won the Matthews Duncan prize and qualified in 1936. He completed house jobs at King George's Hospital, Ilford, and Bart's, and after a succession of training posts at the Royal Northern Hospital, Leicester Royal Infirmary, Broadgreen Hospital and Royal Liverpool Children's Hospital, he passed the FRCS at the first attempt in 1939. He attributed his success in the operative viva to his examiner, Sir Henry Souttar, who rescued him by offering him an elevator to lift up the disc of bone which was adherent to the dura in the cadaver. During this period he was influenced by Kenneth Walker and Barrington-Ward and at first thought of specialising in urology, in which he gained further experience in the RAFVR in North Africa, Italy and at Wroughton, where he followed in the footsteps of Alec Badenoch. He reached the rank of Wing Commander. While in the RAF he developed improved mountain rescue methods, and whilst in Northern Ireland devised pre-packed rations for the flying boats, eliminating the need for vegetable sacks and a Primus stove. He found it was not easy to get into urology and decided to specialise in thoracic surgery, partly from the influence of 'Uncle Tom' Holmes Sellors, and later from experience in Liverpool under Morriston Davies and Ronald Edwards. His own contributions were mainly in the surgery of congenital heart disease at the Royal Liverpool Children's Hospital. In the days when housemen were forbidden to marry, he married (in secret) Honor née Rose, by whom he had two sons and two daughters, one a physiotherapist. In retirement he moved to North Wales, where he pursued his hobbies of music and the theatre. In 1997 he underwent an aortic valve replacement and bypass surgery, but it was complicated by bacterial endocarditis from which he never really made a full recovery, and which led to his death on 26 April 2001.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008470
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Nicholson, William Francis (1909 - 2002)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008800-E008899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/381001381001
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Frank Nicholson was a senior surgeon at Manchester Royal Infirmary. He was born in Cheshire on 6 September 1909, the son of Charles James Nicholson, a cotton merchant. Educated at St Bee's School, Cumbria, he had a distinguished academic record before proceeding to St Catherine's College, Cambridge, for his pre-clinical studies. He chose to return North to Manchester for his clinical course. After qualification, he spent his early posts in Manchester Royal Infirmary, after which he went to the USA, where he spent a year at Washington University, St Louis. He married Rosabelle Gough on 27 July 1939 and had two children, Roger - also a Cambridge graduate - who is a paediatrician in Ontario, Canada, and a daughter, Jane, who is a psychotherapist at Manchester Royal Infirmary. From 1940 to 1945 he served in the RAMC in Egypt, Palestine, Tripoli, Sicily and Italy, where he was chest surgeon to the 8th Army, reaching the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He was awarded a military MBE and was twice mentioned in despatches. He wrote four papers from 1944 to 1946 on his surgical experiences, later his publications reflected his interests in general thoracic surgery (1948 to 1960) and then in thyroid and parathyroid disorders (from 1960 to 1973). Appointed as an honorary surgeon to the Manchester Northern Hospital in 1946, he retained this as his main appointment until the inception of the NHS, when he was appointed surgeon to the Manchester Royal Infirmary. He held this post until his retirement in 1974, when he did locums on St Helena. Because of his interest in thoracic surgery, he was appointed as a thoracic surgeon for the whole of this period by the regional board. For many years he was an internal examiner at Manchester and also for the Royal College of Surgeons of England in the primary FRCS. He was active in many surgical societies, being President of the Manchester Surgical Society in 1963, the Medical Society in 1971 and was also active in the Association of Surgeons and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, and regularly attended meetings of the Travelling Surgical Society of Great Britain and Northern Ireland with his wife. He was an accomplished viola player, and continued to hone his skills in retirement, in addition to tending his garden. These, and fly fishing, remained his main hobbies until his death on 30 August 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008818
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Thomas, Dillwyn Malcolm Ewart (1907 - 1985)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-08-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007700-E007799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379886379886
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Dillwyn Malcolm Ewart Thomas was born at Nantymoel, South Wales, in 1907 and was educated at Monmouth School where he played in the rugby football team and gained his first XV colours. He then entered St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School which he also represented at rugby and qualified in 1933. Shortly before taking his final examinations he developed a pleural effusion which was treated with prolonged rest and this inspired an interest in the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. His initial appointment was as house surgeon at the Royal Gwent Hospital, Newport, and in 1934 he joined the staff of the Welsh National Memorial Association, which was responsible for prevention and treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. He was appointed first assistant medical officer at Glan Ely Hospital, Cardiff, and later thoracic surgeon at Sully Hospital, Glamorgan. He joined the Territorial Army before the war and was called up into the Royal Army Medical Corps shortly after its outbreak. He was soon released to continue his civilian work at Sully, which became the regional centre for the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. He was appointed consultant thoracic surgeon to the United Cardiff Hospitals in 1948 and passed his FRCS in 1954. Before the introduction of chemotherapy he was a strong advocate of a surgical approach to tension cavity disease of the lung. He also contributed to the literature on hydatid disease of the lung, writing articles in the *British journal of surgery* and chapters in standard textbooks. After the introduction of chemotherapy for tuberculosis he developed an interest in open heart surgery which he pioneered in Wales. He retired in 1972 but continued to live in South Glamorgan. He served as president of Dinas Powis Golf Club in 1985 and he played regularly up to the last. He had wide interests and was always a stimulating companion with a great sense of humour. He enjoyed his long retirement making excellent recoveries from two serious illnesses. He died on 6 October 1985 survived by his wife, two daughters, and five grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007703
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jones, Peter Henry (1917 - 1984)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-26
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007300-E007399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379555379555
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Peter Henry Jones was born in Monmouth on 1 March 1917 and educated at Haberdashers' Aske's West Monmouth School in Pontypool. He studied medicine at the Westminster Hospital and qualified in 1939. After house appointments at the Westminster Hospital he served in the RAMC from 1942 to 1946 as Regimental Medical Officer to a field artillery regiment in North Africa and Italy. He took part in the Salerno landing and the assault on Monte Cassino, being mentioned in despatches. Typically, he refused promotion in order to remain with his regiment, which he did for four years, and this selfless attitude was characteristic of him. On demobilisation he decided to train in surgery, and took his FRCS in 1948. Subsequently he went to the Brompton and Westminster Hospitals training in thoracic surgery under Sir Clement Price Thomas, whom he assisted with a thoracotomy on King George VI, spending three weeks living in Buckingham Palace. For this he was awarded the MVO. In 1955 he was appointed thoracic surgeon to Baguley and Davyhulme Hospitals and in 1960 to Manchester Royal Infirmary. The same year he spent six months with Dr Frank Gerbode at the Presbyterian Hospital in San Francisco learning the new techniques of open heart surgery. In 1962 he was invited to join the staff of the Westminster Hospital as thoracic surgeon, where he remained until his early retirement. He was made Hunterian Professor in 1958 giving his lecture on sleeve resection of the bronchus, and he was founder-member of Pete's Club, a travelling thoracic surgical club, whose only rule was that "no member should report any case which reflects credit upon himself". Pomposity and insincerity were abhorrent to him. He retired early because of coronary artery disease, and pursued his interests in fishing and antique clocks. He bore his final illness, which deprived him of his voice, with courage and humour, raising many laughs with sign language. When he died on 30 July 1984 he was survived by his wife Monica, herself a doctor, and their son and daughter and four grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007372
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bingham, John Alexander Walton (1911 - 1983)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-04-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007100-E007199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379322379322
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born on 1 February 1911, in Belfast, the son of John Alexander Bingham, pharmaceutical chemist, and Essie Jane (née Carlson), John was educated at the Methodist College and Queen's University, Belfast. He won the Musgrave Prize in pathology and the Coulter and McWhitty Prizes. After graduating MB, BCh, BAO in 1934, he was resident at the Royal Victoria Hospital before moving to King Edward VII Hospital, Windsor, where he was resident surgical officer for three years. He became FRCS in 1938 and spent a year at Queen Mary's Hospital, Roehampton, before joining the Indian Medical Service in September, 1939. His experience at Roehampton was invaluable in India and Malaya where he served throughout the war. He dealt with very many battle casualties and developed much experience of amputations and painful stumps. His work on these problems led to a thesis on the mechanism and management of causalgia, for which he was awarded the degree of MCh in 1946. He attained the rank of Major in the IMS and returned, soon after the war ended, to the Brompton Hospital, where he developed the interest and skills that determined his future career. He was briefly a surgical registrar in Belfast before being appointed honorary consultant thoracic surgeon to the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children in 1947, and consultant thoracic surgeon to the Royal Victoria Infirmary in 1950. He served these hospitals until he retired in 1976. Bingham was a reserved, almost monosyllabic man, a surgeon of careful technique. He was awarded a cricket "Blue" in his undergraduate days and with three medical friends, he enjoyed an unbroken foursome at golf for 33 years. In 1967 he had his second myocardial infarct while playing golf in the south of Ireland but he returned to the game as soon as he was fit. He died on 1 January 1983, a month short of his 72nd birthday, survived by his brother. He was not married.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007139
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Flavell, Geoffrey (1913 - 1994)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-09-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007900-E007999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380114380114
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Geoffrey Flavell was born on 23 February 1913 in Wellington, New Zealand, the son of Alfred William Flavell, an industrialist, and Elizabeth, née Spry-Harris, the daughter of a gold prospector. He was educated at Waitaki Boys' High School, Otago Boys' High School and Otago University, where he read medicine. He then came to England to continue his training at Bart's. He qualified there in 1937. Within four years he passed the Fellowship of the College and became a member of the Royal College of Physicians, being elected to its Fellowship in 1973. During the second world war he was a surgical specialist in the RAF serving in the Middle East. At the end of the war he retired with the rank of wing commander and subsequently became surgical adviser in thoracic surgery to the RAF. He trained at the Brompton and London Hospitals, was appointed to the staff of the latter and served as a consultant thoracic surgeon to the North East Thames Regional Health Authority. He was also invited on to the staff of the Royal Masonic Hospital to inaugurate thoracic surgery there. He is remembered as a surgeon with superlative surgical panache who completed operations in half the time it took many of his contemporaries. A film taken of him correcting an oesophageal abnormality for teaching purposes was once previewed by his staff. With such dispatch did he perform the operation that they had the impression that the film was being shown in fast motion and not projected at the normal speed. He did not suffer fools gladly and detested having his time wasted. Consequently he was not a committee man and did not become much involved in medical politics. However, when towards the end of his career because of his seniority he was required to chair the London Hospital surgical divisional meetings, his efficiency, command of language, quick thinking and incisive mind ensured that business was concluded swiftly. Alongside his career in thoracic surgery, Flavell had many interests: architecture, art, history and a knowledge of wine and food. He was elected a Chevalier de la Confrérie de Tastevin de Bourgogne and was a member of the Dr Johnson Society. To foster his activities he travelled to many parts of the world, but an appreciation of his many talents is not complete without recording his literary ability. Many articles on thoracic surgical topics flowed from his pen as well as two books, one on the oesophagus and the other, *An introduction to chest surgery*, both very informative and easy to read. He was a traditionalist with a dry sense of humour. In his own BMJ obituary he referred to himself as a 'stoic' who kept a copy of Seneca by his bed. Not opposed to innovation he furthered thoracic surgical knowledge and technique, but he considered well established methods preferable to some so-called advances. When the fibre optic bronchoscope was introduced, partly replacing the rigid instrument, his colleagues remember him disdainfully referring to it as an illuminated piece of spaghetti. He married Joan Margaret Adams ('Fan') in 1943. She was the sister of the Professor of Pathology at Guy's Hospital. She survived him when he died on 28 November 1994 of cancer of the prostate.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007931
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Fawcett, Alan Wordsworth (1896 - 1969)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-07-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005700-E005799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377908377908
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Alan Wordsworth Fawcett was born on the 18th October, 1896, the son of Edward Fawcett, Professor of Anatomy at Bristol University. He was educated at Clifton College, Bristol. He intended to study medicine, but his university career was interrupted by two years' service as Surgeon Sub-Lieutenant in the RNVR. Following this service he entered the University of Edinburgh and graduated MB ChB in 1923. After graduation he held house posts at the Royal Hospital and the Jessop Hospital for Women in Sheffield, where he became resident surgical officer. He took the FRCS in 1927. In 1929 he was appointed surgical registrar at the Royal Infirmary, Sheffield, and in 1931 was appointed honorary assistant surgeon and full surgeon in 1940. He was particularly interested in thoracic surgery and in 1946, at a time when thoracic surgery was emerging as a specialty, he was appointed the first surgeon in charge of the thoracic department at the Royal Infirmary, and when the teaching hospitals in Sheffield amalgamated he was appointed thoracic surgeon of the United Sheffield Hospitals. Alan Fawcett was a careful, reliable surgeon, with unusual technical ability. To watch him operate was an education in surgical technique. His ability as a thoracic surgeon was recognised quickly and he was appointed visiting thoracic surgeon at several hospitals in Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire. He was highly respected by his hospital colleagues and was an enthusiastic and popular teacher in the Sheffield Medical School. He was not a prolific writer, but the few papers he published on pulmonary and cardiac problems were significant. He took a very active part in the professional life of the city, being the assistant secretary of the Sheffield Division of the British Medical Association for many years, and Chairman of the year 1940-1941. Alan Fawcett had many outside interests. With his superb manual dexterity he became a very gifted model builder, and his detailed model of HMS *Tigress*, the destroyer in which he served in the first world war gained a prize at the doctors' hobbies exhibition of the BMA. He was also a wireless enthusiast, and was very well known all over the world from contacts on his magnificent amateur radio sets. He retired in 1961, leaving Sheffield to live in Aberdovey, where for many years he had spent happy holidays with his family. He continued with his interest in model construction and in radio transmissions, and delighted to entertain his many friends. He married a Sheffield medical graduate, Dr Janet Breakey, in 1932. He died on the 11 October 1969 at the age of 72.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005725
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Smiley, Thomas Boyd (1917 - 1981)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-03-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006900-E006999
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379129379129
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details It could be said that had Tom Smiley not been a cigarette smoker in 1941, his patients and colleagues, thoracic surgery and his own family and local community would never have known him as a fine surgeon, husband and father and dedicated churchman, for it was a cigarette-case in his breast-pocket which deflected the point of a Japanese bayonet in Singapore. Born on 9 May 1917 at Castlewellan, Co Down, educated at the Methodist College, Belfast, where he captained the 1st XV and was head of school, he entered Queen's University and after qualifying and working as a house surgeon at the Royal Victoria Infirmary he joined the RAMC and was posted to the Far East. Thus it came about that at the fall of Singapore his cigarette-case saved him from death. As a prisoner of war, and having a desire, if he survived, to be a surgeon one day, he was profoundly influenced by the example set by the surgeon, Julian Taylor FRCS, in the POW camp. Tom was awarded the MC and was mentioned twice in despatches. Returning to Belfast he lost no time in sitting the FRCS and his interest in thoracic surgery took him to the Brompton Hospital where as RSO he was influenced by Sir Clement Price Thomas. In 1951 he was appointed consultant to the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Belfast, and to Forster Green and Whiteabbey Hospitals, where, like so many distinguished colleagues in those days before streptomycin and PAS became available, he took on the large amount of the surgery of pulmonary tuberculosis that had to be done. After the chemotherapeutic revolution for tuberculosis he was able to devote himself more to the development of oesophageal surgery to which he contributed significantly, and to the new cardiac surgery of the 50's. In 1950, while still a registrar, he carried out the first mitral valvotomy in Ireland and with John Bingham established the cardiothoracic surgical unit in Belfast instituting the open heart surgical programme. A lover of the countryside and animals, especially horses, he farmed 60 acres at Magheragall, N Ireland, but on retirement in 1977 he moved to Bridge Farm at Litcham, Norfolk, which, with his wife Elizabeth (Mills) whom he married in 1945, he completely rebuilt and restored. In October 1980 he was visiting Professor of Surgery at the University of Malaysia, and retired only a month before his death. He was mourned by his wife, three sons, Christopher, Ian and Eric (two of whom are doctors in New Zealand) and daughter, Fiona. He died on 2 August 1981, aged 64 years.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006946
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Crafoord, Clarence (1899 - 1984)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007200-E007299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379407379407
Occupation Cardiovascular surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details The College has no detailed record of Professor Clarence Crafoord and the following is derived from the citation given by Sir Clement Price Thomas on the occasion of Professor Crafoord's admission to the Honorary Fellowship at a College Council meeting on 13 March 1958. Some further information has been added from an article by Ivar Palmer in *Acta chirurgica scandinavica*, supplement 245, 1959. Clarence Crafoord was born on 28 May 1899 and was later regarded as something of an infant prodigy in surgery. He always had wide horizons and the catholicity of his interests was mirrored in his publications. His main interest was thoracic surgery and his greatest contributions were in the field of cardiovascular surgery. The first of the hundred contributions he made to the scientific literature was when, as a young surgeon of 28, at the Swedish Surgical Society, he reported two patients successfully operated upon for massive pulmonary embolism. This fired a lifelong interest in venous thromboembolism, and immediately heparin was isolated by his fellow countryman, Professor Jorpes, he began an intensive investigation into its use. His preliminary observations were published in 1937. During the intervening period he had been working on the problems of anaesthesia for thoracic surgery. He put on a firm scientific basis the principle of what he termed rhythmic ventilation, perfecting the anaesthetic machine which had first been devised by his old chief, Professor J.H. Giertz, with whom he worked for twenty years at the Sabbatsberg Hospital. He performed the first operation for coarctation of the aorta in 1944 and so gave real impetus to the dawning interest in cardiac surgery which then became his chief concern as he developed his service at the Karolinska Hospital, Stockholm. As a result of this work he was honoured in many lands and received the MD (honoris causa) from five foreign universities. He was an Honorary Fellow of the American College of Surgeons and honorary fellow of many foreign scientific societies. He was awarded the Leriche Medal of the International Society of Surgery and was President of the European Cardiovascular Society and the International Cardiovascular Society. The celebration of Clarence Crafoord's fiftieth birthday was uniquely marked by a presentation to him, by the King of Sweden, of a large sum of money which had been publicly subscribed on a nationwide basis. This he used to finance research in his professorial department of surgery, at the University of Stockholm. Crafoord was held in high regard in his own country and, as a man who radiated friendliness, he inevitably became a globetrotter with a host of devoted friends in many lands. He died, aged 84, on 25 February 1984.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007224
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Macedo, Manuel Machado (1922 - 2000)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008700-E008799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380936380936
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Manuel Macedo was Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery in Lisbon and an internationally respected thoracic surgeon. He was born in the Azores in 1922. He studied medicine at the medical school of Lisbon University, and graduated in 1946, after which he spent a year as honorary assistant to Löffler at the University of Zurich, before returning to Lisbon to do junior posts for the next four years. In 1952, he won a British Council scholarship, which took him to England, where he attended a course at the Brompton Hospital, and was taken under the wing of Sir Clement Price Thomas, who arranged for him to work at the Leicester Chest Unit under Gordon Cruickshank and Betty Slesser. During a period when Cruickshank was away in the United States, Macedo seized the opportunity to work with Phillip Allison in Leeds as a locum senior registrar in the absence of Alf Gunning, and visited A L d'Abreu and Jack Collis in Birmingham. At the end of his year in Leicester, he was invited to stay on as a senior house officer, with the actual duties of registrar. He gained considerable practical experience while he was in the UK, and on his return to Portugal in 1954 he passed a new competitive examination to become consultant in thoracic surgery at the City Hospitals in Lisbon. He was appointed in 1956. He began a programme of open heart surgery, eventually establishing two centres in the Lisbon area, becoming director of the department of thoracic surgery in 1969 and Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery at the New University of Lisbon in 1979, and at the University of Lisbon in 1985. He founded the Portuguese Society of Surgery, and the Portuguese Society of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery, of which he was the first President. In 1987, he was President of the Portuguese Medical Association. He kept up his contacts with his colleagues in the UK, and was made the first foreign member of the Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons. In 1986 he was President of the European Society for Cardiovascular Surgery, presiding over the congress in Brighton. He received many national and international honours. He was a member of the Royal Academy of Medicine in Belgium. He was a Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur and Commandeur de l'Ordre du Mérite of France, and in Portugal was appointed a Great Official of the Order of Santiago and the Sword. He was made an honorary FRCS in 1990. He died in 2000.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008753
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Marchand, Paul Edmond (1920 - 2002)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008700-E008799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380943380943
Occupation Cardiothoracic surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Paul Marchand was born in Johannesburg on 19 November 1920. His father, Georges Edmond, was a Swiss watchmaker and jeweller who settled in South Africa in 1912. His mother, Guerra Pardini, was the daughter of Italian parents who had owned a hotel in Johannesburg since 1890. She was born in 1900 during the Boer war when Lord Roberts accepted the surrender of the town, hence her name ('Guerra' means 'war' in Italian). Paul was educated at King Edward VII School and the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, qualifying in 1944. He came to England to specialise in surgery, working first at Newcastle under T A Hindmarsh, and later at Guy's under Russell Brock from 1952 to 1954. He was invited to give the Moynihan lecture in Leeds in 1953, was the Nuffield dominion fellow for South Africa in 1953, and won the Moynihan medal in 1954 and the Jacksonian prize in 1956. He completed his training in cardiothoracic surgery at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA. On his return to Johannesburg, he was appointed a consultant at Johannesburg Hospital, where he ultimately became chief of cardiothoracic surgery and head of the department of thoracic surgery. Paul was an associate founder of the College of Medicine of South Africa, and its convenor for cardiothoracic surgery from 1972 to 1993. He was President of the Cardiac Society of South Africa from 1968 to 1970 and Chairman of the Cardio-Thoracic Society from 1968 to 1992. He published more than 70 papers, including pioneer reports of mesothelioma. His career spanned virtually all the important milestones of cardiothoracic surgery, beginning at the stage of pulmonary resections for carcinoma, bronchiectasis etc, progressing through closed to open heart surgery. His first human by-pass operation was performed in 1958, and he carried out more than 1,000 afterwards. He was an avid South African military historian, particularly with regard to the Boer war. He was a keen fly fisherman and owned a trout farm on the Eastern Transvaal escarpment, to which he retired at weekends. A keen gardener, he loved Italian cooking, made his own gnocchi and grew his own artichokes and asparagus. He married Zoe Bisset, a descendant of an 1820 settler family. Her great grandfather General Sir John Bisset became Governor-General of Gibraltar. They had three sons and one daughter, two of whom entered medicine. He died on 9 July 2002.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008760
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching McMillan, Ian Kenneth Ramsay (1922 - 1989)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-06-15
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007400-E007499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379680379680
Occupation Cardiac surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Ian McMillan was born on 14 June 1922 in Birmingham, the second son of Kenneth Holl MacMillan, (Lives 1974-82) consultant gynaecologist and obstetrician, and Elizabeth (née Smyth). His uncle was a chest physician, his wife a physiotherapist and her parents general practitioners. He was educated at the Dragon School, Oxford, St Paul's, London (scholar), Jesus College, Cambridge (exhibitioner) and St Thomas's Hospital (exhibitioner). After qualifying in 1946 he served as Major, RAMC as a specialist physiologist in Germany and the UK (1947-1950). On return he was the Mackenzie-Mackinnon Research Fellow, RCS (1951-1954) working on the development of cardiac surgery and by-pass, later serving as RCS representative on the RCS, RCP joint committee in cardiology in 1967. He was visiting scientist National Heart Institute, Bethesda (1954-1955). He passed the FRCS in 1956 and was senior lecturer surgical unit at St Thomas's Hospital before becoming consultant thoracic surgeon to the Wessex cardiac and thoracic unit, Southampton, in 1959. He was also honorary lecturer in cardiac surgery, Royal Postgraduate Medical School. After the death of Paul Chin he became head of the Wessex unit. His contribution to the science and literature of cardiac and thoracic surgery was considerable, including the design of his pulse duplicator, the study of heart value function by high speed cine-photography and the first paper from the United Kingdom on electrical defibrillation of the heart in 1952. He was held in high regard as a hard-working, skillful and meticulous surgeon, an affable 'big' man. He retired in 1987. In 1950 lie married Diana Sandiland and they had one son and two daughters, Andrew and Fiona becoming doctors and Cynthia, a dentist. He enjoyed cricket and rugby in his youth and later, fishing and tennis. He obtained great pleasure from classical music and loved to travel. He was a founder-member of Pete's Club, an international surgical club, and established a visiting fellowship for surgeons in training at the Massachusetts General Hospital to come to the Southampton Unit. He died on 21 September 1989.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007497
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Cory, Richard Alexander Seymour (1903 - 1983)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

First Title value, for Searching Skinner, David Bernt (1935 - 2003)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-02 2007-08-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372340372340
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details David Skinner was an eminent American thoracic surgeon and one of the most influential individuals affecting surgical and medical care in the United States in the last quarter of the twentieth century. He was born on 28 April 1935 in Joliet, Illinois, the first child of James and Bertha Skinner, and educated at Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He joined the Boy Scouts and maintained an interest in the movement throughout his life. After graduating with distinction from the University of Rochester, he studied medicine at Yale, where his MD was awarded *cum laude*. He trained in general and thoracic surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital, completing his residencies in 1965, when he went to Bristol as senior surgical registrar to Ronald Belsey and developed a life-long interest in surgery of the oesophagus. During the Vietnam war he served for two years in the US Air Force. He returned to join the surgical faculty of Johns Hopkins Hospital under George Zuidema. At Johns Hopkins he rapidly rose to full professor in 1972. Shortly thereafter he was appointed as the first Dallas B Phemister professor of surgery at the University of Chicago Medical School. He developed an administrative model that encompassed clinical excellence, basic surgical research, dedicated teaching and a remarkable degree of autonomy for faculty growth. His personal devotion to the development of his faculty was life-long and legendary. In 1987 he moved to New York to become President and chief executive officer of the New York Hospital and professor of surgery at Cornell Medical College. Under his leadership financial difficulties were reversed, a new hospital purchased, a new pavilion built and a merger achieved with the Presbyterian Hospital of Columbia University. He retired in 1999, but remained active as President emeritus of the New York Presbyterian Hospital and professor of surgery and cardiothoracic surgery at Weill Cornell. He served on several philanthropic and corporate boards. He generously hosted the group that travelled from our College to New York under the presidency of Sir Barry Jackson. During his career he served as President of several scientific and surgical societies, including the Association of Academic Surgery, the Society of University Surgeons and the International Society for Diseases of the Esophagus, and was a member of multiple societies, including the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Science. He received three honorary degrees and 15 medals or prizes for his contributions. He was made an honorary medical officer of the fire department of New York city, gaining the parking privilege that came with the honour. His faith was extremely important to him: he was a trustee of the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago and the Fifth Presbyterian Church of New York. He died on 24 January 2003, following a massive stroke, and is survived by his widow Elinor and four daughters, Linda, Kristin, Carise and Margaret. Linda is a surgeon at Delaware County Hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000153
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Pilcher, Robin Sturtevant (1902 - 1994)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-09-25
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008200-E008299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380442380442
Occupation Cardiac surgeon General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Robin Pilcher was born on 22 June 1902 in Northwood, Middlesex, into a family without medical connections, although his younger brother Michael was to follow him into surgery. His father was Thorold Sturtevant Pilcher and his mother Helena, née Neilson. He was a scholar at St Paul's School and a prizewinning student at University College London and at UCH Medical School. He qualified with the conjoint diploma in 1927 and went on to take the MB with a gold medal in the following year. During his junior appointments at UCH he quickly added the MRCP, the FRCS and the MS to an impeccable *curriculum vitae*. Inspired by Wilfred Trotter and C C Choyce he was taken on to the surgical unit and rapidly ascended the ladder, being elected a youthful Professor of Surgery in 1938, a post which he held with distinction throughout his career. Retained in the hospital by the Emergency Medical Service he carried a heavy clinical and teaching burden through all the war years which inevitably restricted his research interests. However he was developing considerable expertise in hand infections and the management of bronchiectasis; after the war he was attached also to the Hospital for Sick Children in Great Ormond Street, where he pioneered thoracic surgery, reporting an important series of cases of lobectomy for bronchiectasis. When the introduction of antibiotics was reducing the need for pulmonary surgery he started to enter the cardiac field, employing the anastomosis of the internal mammary artery to the coronary circulation for the relief of myocardial ischaemia. However, retirement came too soon to enable him to enjoy the boom in cardiac surgery in either adults or children. Although an astute physician as well as a superb surgical technician, Pilcher's natural modesty and reserve prevented him from taking the prominent rôle on the national stage which his talents could well have justified. He served on the Court of Examiners of the College (being Chairman in 1965) and examined for several universities. He was a member of the MRC War Wounds Committee. Although in private he could show a ready sense of humour he was superficially somewhat austere and not an easy man to know. However his ability as a surgeon and as a teacher gained him the respect of his students and the devotion of his assistants. He married, while still a junior in 1929, Mabel Ethel Pearks, by whom he had two sons and a daughter, none of whom entered the medical profession. He retired in 1967 to a Buckinghamshire village and immersed himself in gardening and village affairs, maintaining a beautiful garden in their elegant 16th century home, although increasing deafness cut him off from old friends and former interests. He died on 10 July 1994, survived by his wife, children and grandchildren.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008259
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Jowett, Andrew Waring (1933 - 1996)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-09-15
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008100-E008199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380301380301
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Andrew Jowett was born in Sunderland in 1933, where his father, Ronald, an honorary FRCS, was an ENT surgeon and a member of the Newcastle Regional Hospital Board. Andrew was educated at Sedbergh School and St John's College, Cambridge, where he gained his BA in 1954. He subsequently went on to the London Hospital Medical School where he qualified in 1957, having won the Glenfield Harris surgery prize in his final year. After posts as house surgeon to the professorial unit at the London, house physician at the Ipswich and casualty officer at the Central Middlesex Hospital, he did his National Service in the RAMC from 1960 to 1962. This took him to Aldershot as medical officer to the Army PT School and the Cambridge Military Hospital, and he was involved with the Hurricane Relief Force in British Honduras. This was followed by a three year surgical registrar rotation in Leeds, an appointment as registrar to the thoracic unit at Leeds General Infirmary in 1965, and, in 1966, as senior registrar to the United Birmingham Hospitals. Here he worked with Professor Leigh Collis and Mr L D Abrams. He held this post until 1972, spending a year between 1969 and 1970 working as surgical, clinical and research assistant with Professor A Senning in Zurich. His research in Zurich was on the lymphatic drainage of the heart and how this was affected by cardiac surgical procedures, including transplantation. This work provided the basis for his Arris and Gale lecture in November 1971, entitled *Surgical implications of cardiac lymphatic drainage*. He was appointed consultant thoracic surgeon at Wolverhampton in 1972. This was a single-handed post covering all aspects of general thoracic surgery, and allowed him to develop his interest in oesophageal problems, stimulated originally in Leeds by John Aylwin and Leigh Collis, and augmented by a long association with a Hungarian surgeon, Joseph Imré, who shared this interest, their friendship having dated from the time Imré worked at Leeds with Geoffrey Wooler. He was a founder member of the British Oesophageal Group. In spite of being single-handed with a part share of a registrar, he and his clinical assistant were able, thanks to generous operating time, to provide an efficient and personalised service without a waiting list. He was also surgical tutor and postgraduate dean. A big, genial, pipe-smoking man, he was a compassionate doctor who took pride and pleasure in his work, caring for a widespread 'parish' that extended into mid-Wales, and maintaining an interest in oesophageal function and its assessment. Music was an important part of his life and at school he learned to play the oboe sufficiently well to join the National Youth Orchestra, whose forty year reunion he organised in retirement. After early retirement he made copies of baroque oboes, also enjoying photography and motor sport as a spectator. Having suffered from severe hypertension and an aortic aneurysm, he died of plasma cell dyscrasia on 21 September 1996. He was survived by his wife Ursula, née Jones, a nurse, and two sons, Robert and Gordon, neither of whom has entered the medical profession.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008118
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hayward, John Isaac (1910 - 1999)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-03
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008600-E008699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380845380845
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details John Hayward was a thoracic surgeon based in Melbourne. He was born in East Brunswick, Melbourne, on 16 July 1910. His father, William Isaac Hayward, was a schoolmaster, and his mother, Ellen Grace née Maling, was a nurse. His education was marked at every step by scholarships and prizes. He won a scholarship to Wesley College, but his father preferred University High School, and within a month he had been awarded the Freemasons' King Edward VII memorial scholarship there. Having been *dux* of the school, he left with a full government scholarship to Melbourne University to read medicine. There he gained first class honours and exhibitions each year, passing the first primary FRCS examination to be offered in Melbourne, and qualifying with the Jamieson prize in the year that the first pneumonectomy was performed in Melbourne. After junior appointments at the Melbourne Hospital, he won the Alwyn Stewart scholarship, and, whilst working as surgical clinical assistant at the Melbourne Hospital, he taught pathology and physiology for the next two years, during which time he made important innovations in the method of pleural drainage and gained his MD and MS. He realised that advances in thoracic surgery were going to require specialization and decided to go to London. There he passed the final FRCS, and went to the Brompton Hospital, first as house physician and then as RSO, falling under the influence of J E H Roberts and Russell Brock. During the Blitz, he served as thoracic surgeon to the Emergency Medical Service, and in 1941 joined the Royal Australian Army Medical Corps, serving in the Middle East, New Guinea and Morotai, attaining the rank of Major. After the war, he returned to Melbourne, as the first thoracic surgeon to the Central Hospital, the Royal Melbourne Hospital, and the Repatriation Hospital at Heidelberg. Until he was obliged to retire at the age of 56, he became renowned as an outstanding teacher and trainer of thoracic surgeons, reporting his first 284 closed mitral valvotomies in 1966, with a mortality of 5 per cent. In the early days of cardiac by-pass surgery, he fought to set up an animal unit where the necessary techniques could be learned, overcoming intense local opposition. Together with Sir Edward 'Weary' Dunlop he developed new techniques in oesophageal surgery. In the Royal Australasian College he was a foundation member of the thoracic section, a member of the library committee, and of the Court of Examiners. In 1955 he led a team of self-contained Australian units to New Guinea, where there was an appalling incidence of tuberculosis. In 1959, under the Colombo plan, he led another team on a lecture tour to Malaya, Thailand and Burma, and subsequently he accepted a number of their surgical trainees on his unit. In 1941, he married Ethel née Alty, a St Thomas's Hospital nurse, by whom he had three daughters, Mary Elizabeth, Ruth Alty and Jean Marjorie. She predeceased him in 1991. After her death he began to write a book entitled *Sharing for life* which was published posthumously in 2000. He died on 14 July 1999.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008662
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Drew, Charles Edwin (1916 - 1987)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007100-E007199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379381379381
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Charles Edward Drew, eldest son of Edwin Frank Drew, an accountant, and of Eunice (née Lloyd-Davies) was born in Lambeth on 15 December 1916. He was educated at an elementary school in Stockwell and at Westminster City School and then secured an open scholarship in 1935 to King's College, London, and Westminster Hospital Medical School where he won the Bulkeley Prize in 1938. After graduating in 1941 and doing his first resident appointments he joined the Navy in 1942 as Surgeon-Lieutenant RNVR. The following year his ship was sunk in the Mediterranean whilst he was below deck tending the wounded and he escaped by swimming out through a porthole. He was eventually picked up and continued his service until the end of the war, transferring to the RNR with the rank of Surgeon-Commander. Drew then became successively casualty officer, senior resident medical officer, senior surgical registrar and chief assistant at the Westminster Hospital where he worked with G T Mullallay and Clement Price Thomas, and then surgical chief assistant at the Brompton Hospital before appointment as consultant surgeon to the Westminster and St George's Hospitals. It was in 1952, during the early years of his consultant life, that he assisted his senior colleague Sir Clement Price Thomas with the pneumonectomy operation on King George VI for lung carcinoma. Some years later he was to do a lobectomy on Sir Clement himself for the same disease. Charles Drew was a highly original thinker who was occasionally out of step with his less enterprising colleagues. Although somewhat handicapped by doing too much of his early work in one of the smaller centres, he was the first to use profound hypothermia for open cardiac surgery and did many successful operations by this technique. He published important papers on the clinical use of hyperbaric oxygen and on heart transplantation and was appointed consultant in thoracic surgery to the Royal Navy, honorary consultant in thoracic surgery to the Army, and honorary consultant thoracic surgeon, King Edward VII Hospital, Midhurst. At the Royal College of Surgeons he was Hunterian Professor in 1961, Price Thomas Medallist in 1962; member of the Court of Examiners from 1970 to 1976, and Tudor Edwards Lecturer in 1961. He also served on the editorial committee of the British journal of surgery. A good sportsman throughout his life, he was fond of sailing and water polo in his early days; played cricket and soccer and rowed for London University, later becoming a competent salmon and trout fisherman and a keen gardener and crossword enthusiast. In 1950 he married Maureen Pittaway, a sister in the Queen Alexandra Royal Naval Nursing Service and they had one son and a daughter. After retirement from his hospitals he developed carcinoma of the pharynx. There was a satisfactory initial response to surgery and irradiation but early recurrence of the disease. When he died at home on 31 May 1987 he was survived by his wife and children. A memorial service was held in the chapel at Westminster Hospital.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007198
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Hirschfeld, Franz Konrad Saddler (1904 - 1987)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-05-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007300-E007399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379516379516
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Franz Konrad Saddler Hirschfeld was born on 26 April 1904 in Brisbane, son of Dr Eugen Hirschfeld, a graduate of Strasbourg University, who emigrated to Australia in 1890, to become the first honorary bacteriologist to the Royal Brisbane Hospital and later honorary physician. Konrad was educated at Normal School and then at Brisbane Grammar School. He went to the University of Queensland with an open scholarship, then to Melbourne where he obtained first class honours in anatomy in 1926 and was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship in the following year. He graduated from Oxford in 1930 with first class honours in physiology and the Gotch Memorial Prize. In 1931 he was house surgeon at the London Hospital and obtained his FRCS in 1932. He was surgical registrar and first assistant at the London, working with Henry Souttar, James Walton and Hugh Cairns. He went on to spend 18 months at the Brompton Hospital with Tudor Edwards and Price Thomas. He was appointed junior surgeon to the Royal Brisbane Hospital in 1938 with special interest in thoracic surgery and continued there until his retirement in 1964. Between 1941 and 1946 he served as specialist in the Australian Imperial Force. He was a formidable and colourful character and a hard taskmaster. He pioneered thoracic surgery in Queensland and performed the first successful pneumonectomy and oesophagectomy in the State. He held many posts in the University and the Australian Thoracic Society. He was active in undergraduate and postgraduate teaching and in examining. In recognition of these services he was made a Life Governor of the Australian Postgraduate Medical Federation, Fellow of the Australian Medical Association, CBE (1978) and honorary doctorate of surgery (1982). His other interests included rowing - for the Universities of Queensland, Melbourne and New College, Oxford. He was a keen student of medical history and the Medical History Museum at Queensland Medical School, of which he was curator, housed one of the finest collections of old surgical instruments and medical equipment in Australia. While in the Army he became an expert on military footwear and from 1958 to 1962 he was the official advisor on footwear to the Pacific Island Regiment. He listed his hobbies as chutney-making (for which he won prizes) and reading. He was unpretentious, with an enquiring mind and an utterly honourable man. In 1939 he married Brigid Cooney and they had four daughters, Mary, Geraldine, Brigid and Roisin. The eldest, Mary, is a medical practitioner. He died on 10 March 1987 aged 82.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007333
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Denham, Hono Evan Horrell (1913 - 1991)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-09-07
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007800-E007899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380081380081
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Evan Denham was born in Brisbane on 18 May 1913, but was brought up in New Zealand where his father, Henry George Denham, was Professor of Chemistry and Rector of Canterbury University. His mother was Helen Horrell, of farming stock. He was educated at Christ's College, Christchurch, and Canterbury University, where he won the Parker Prize and played cricket and hockey for the university. He was house surgeon at Christchurch Hospital and then came to England for surgical training. After demonstrating anatomy at Newcastle he served as RSO at the Royal Masonic Hospital and the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Hospital in Oswestry, where he was much influenced by Reginald Watson-Jones and Henry Osmond Clarke, and met his future wife, a Scottish nurse. He worked in the EMS Hospital in Hackney during the Blitz on London, and took the FRCS along with 34 others in a College that had recently been severely bombed. Sadly, he died before completing his memoir of the College at that time. Having passed the Fellowship he joined the New Zealand Expeditionary Force Medical Corps from 1941 to 1945, becoming captain and surgical specialist and serving in North Africa and Italy. At the end of the war he returned to Christchurch on the surgical staff and remained there until 1978, with refresher visits between 1949 and 1950 to gain experience in thoracic surgery in Leeds, Shotley Bridge, and Sully Chest Hospital, Glamorgan; in the summer of 1967 he visited St Bartholomew's and St George's Hospitals. Back in Christchurch he carried on an extensive practice in the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis and neonatal surgery, whilst continuing general surgery. He was one of the first in New Zealand to operate on a baby with congenital atresia of the oesophagus. In 1952 he added to his appointments by joining Greymouth Hospital. Subjects of particular interest to him were the parathyroid, parotid and portal hypertension. Evan Denham was an active supporter of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, serving on the Dominion Committee and the Court of Examiners from 1960 to 1970. His central role in organizing national postgraduate education was recognized by his becoming Chairman of the New Zealand Postgraduate Medical Federation from 1966 to 1976. An enthusiastic sportsman, he played hockey and cricket in his youth and later became expert in fishing, shooting and golf. He was a keen member of the Order of St John. In 1946 he married in Christchurch the nurse he had met in Oswestry, Ada (Bunty), née Robertson, from Glasgow. They had three daughters, all of whom became nurses, and a son, who took up farming. Although in later years he had become severely disabled, his death on 16 June 1991 was unexpected.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007898
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barlow, Donald Spiers Monteagle (1905 - 1994)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-09-02
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007800-E007899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379991379991
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Donald Barlow was born on 4 July 1905 in Leytonstone, son of Leonard Barlow, an electrical engineer, and Katherine Monteagle. His eldest brother Leonard was killed at the age of 18 after winning the MC with two bars in the Royal Flying Corps; the second became FRS and a professor at University College, London; the youngest became a successful engineer. Donald Barlow was educated at Whitgift School, Croydon, and University College and Medical School, London, where he qualified in 1927, having been much influenced by Wilfred Trotter and Gwynne Williams. He passed the FRCS at the age of 24 but had to wait until the next year before he could receive the diploma, being thought too young for the distinction. He also won the gold medal for the MS. He took a series of junior posts at the Norfolk and Norwich and the West London Hospitals, where Tyrrell Gray and Oswald Anderson directed his attention to the surgery of the chest. In 1934 he married Violet Elizabeth McIver, a theatre sister at Great Ormond Street Hospital. He was appointed consultant surgeon to the Southend Hospitals in 1936; to St John's Lewisham in 1937 and to Luton and Dunstable in 1940. Motoring was easier in those days and he combined these dispersed appointments with a thriving practice in Harley Street. He remained in these posts under the Emergency Medical Service throughout the war, but then gave up Lewisham for the London Chest Hospital, where he built up a reputation as a thoracic surgeon. Barlow served the College as an Examiner and Penrose May Tutor. He made important contributions to the literature of surgery, including chapters in Rodney Smith's *Progress of clinical surgery* (1960) and Rob and Smith's *Operative surgery* (1969). Important innovations in surgery included his revolutionary bilateral adrenalectomy and oöphorectomy: the operation was first performed on two terminally ill patients with breast cancer, both of whom recovered to enjoy another twenty years of life. He also devised several ingenious instruments, including a vascular clamp and a gastroscope. A frequent visitor to Ceylon, where he was able to teach the surgical treatment of tuberculosis, he accepted an honorary MB BS (Ceylon) but declined the offer of a CBE. India, Egypt and Iraq were among other countries which he helped with advice given at the highest level on the treatment of TB and on the development of skills in cardiac and thoracic surgery. Barlow's retirement in 1970 gave him the opportunity to enjoy his many hobbies, including painting in watercolours, writing and playing golf. He died on 5 July 1994, survived by his wife, a son, John, also FRCS, and three of his four daughters - Mary (qualified in law), Diane (BA, a linguist and artist) and Jane (a nurse). His daughter Jennifer had died while she was a law student.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007808
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Allison, Philip Rowland (1907 - 1974)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-10-31
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006200-E006299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378436378436
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Philip Rowland Allison, the son of J R Allison, was born at Selby, Yorkshire, on June 2 1907, and was educated at Hymers College, Hull. He was one of a family of five, two others of whom became doctors. He entered the Leeds Medical School in 1924 and had a brilliant career, taking the BSc with first class honours in physiology in 1927, and the MB ChB, with first class honours in 1931. He became FRCS in 1932, when he was only 25, and ChM in 1936. Allison's ambition from the beginning was to become a leader in surgery and he lost no time on the way. After a series of junior appointments he was elected to the staff of the General Infirmary at Leeds in 1936 when only 29 and worked for five years as a general surgeon. By 1941 he had decided that his surgical field of choice was the chest and he became the first thoracic surgeon at the General Infirmary in Leeds, eventually becoming surgeon in charge and thoracic surgeon to the Leeds Regional Hospital Board, and senior lecturer in thoracic surgery in 1949. During the war he was thoracic surgical adviser to the Emergency Medical Service for his part of England, and he had a mobile thoracic surgical team ready to deal with air-raid casualties. By the end of the war he had established an international reputation in his field and was generally held to be a leading oesophageal surgeon, with a special expertise in hiatus hernia. In 1953 the Chair of Surgery at Leeds became vacant and the surgeons there of one accord recommended Allison. His purpose was now clear. It was to be head of the best department of thoracic surgery in the Commonwealth, but the university did not provide all that he asked for. He left Leeds and accepted the Nuffield Chair of Surgery at Oxford, spending the next two years in physiological research. Allison had learnt that it was not possible to maintain a lead in thoracic and cardiac surgery without expensive equipment but in spite of considerable initial resistance he built a first class department in Oxford. His main contribution to surgery while there was to set an example of practice. He always insisted that he was not just a thoracic surgeon and his work extended over a wide field. Technically he was outstanding and was early recognised as a leader in his speciality, above all in the surgery of the oesophagus. It may be that some of his administrative duties clashed with his personality and he found them rather irksome. In the operating theatre he combined boldness and originality in conception with meticulous care in execution. He did his own post-operative dressings and spent much time in the instruction of his nurses so as to ensure the best team-work. His unit was, in fact, a small, closely knit family. Allison was a little below middle height with hair already white by the time he was fifty. He always wore a bow tie, sometimes of unusual span and brightness, and this, with a handkerchief appearing from his breast pocket and the flower in his buttonhole, gave him the type of appearance which medical students love to caricature. His chief recreations were shooting and fishing. He married Kathleen Greaves in 1937 and they had two sons and one daughter. He died at the age of 66 on 6 March 1974.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006253
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Janes, Robert Meredith (1894 - 1966)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-08-18
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005800-E005899
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378030378030
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Robert Janes was born the son of a farmer at Watford, Ontario on 6 September 1894, and never lost his love of the land and the beauties of nature. Shortly after graduating in medicine from the University of Toronto in 1916, he joined the Canadian Army Medical Corps and served in England and France till 1919, chiefly in laboratories, where his duties provided a sure foundation for a surgical career. He held junior surgical appointments at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, and at the Toronto General Hospital; there was also a period in 1922 when he worked at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London. He became surgeon to the Toronto General Hospital in 1923, and in association with Norman Shenstone developed a centre for thoracic surgery which became world-famous for technical advances in lung resection. His thoracic work was not confined to the lung, for he wrote also of his experience in the removal of tumours of the chest wall, and in treating diverticula of the lower oesophagus. In 1947 Janes succeeded Edward Gallie as Professor of Surgery in the University of Toronto and Surgeon-in-Chief of the Toronto General Hospital, an appointment which he held till his retirement in 1957. He took over the department at a time when many young doctors were returning from war service, which gave him the opportunity of developing still further the excellent training programme instituted by Gallie which had already established the reputation of Toronto as a first-class centre for surgical training. His trainees learnt much more than mere surgical technique, and the influence of his warm friendship so endeared him to them that in 1955 they formed the Janes Surgical Society, at the annual meetings of which Dr and Mrs Janes were present as the patrons. The Society celebrated his 70th birthday in 1964 by meetings in Glasgow, Edinburgh and London, culminating in a dinner at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, an occasion which was appreciated by his many friends in the College. Janes was much more than a great surgeon, a superb teacher, and an able administrator, for his integrity and wisdom made him an ideal leader, and his counsel was sought and obtained by many bodies beyond his own department. He served for many years on the Council of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, of which he was President in 1955-57. He was on the Board of Regents of the American College of Surgeons, and President of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery and the Canadian Association of Clinical Surgeons. He was responsible for the inception of the Canadian journal of surgery in 1957, which owed much to his wise guidance as chairman of the editorial board till he retired from that office in 1965. Indeed his services to surgery knew no national bounds, and his natural genius for friendship was manifested as far afield as the West Indies and parts of Africa which he visited as Simms Commonwealth Travelling Professor in 1958. It is remarkable that in the course of such a full professional life he found time for other occupations and hobbies, but he was able to do a great deal of specialized photography, and took a delight in gardening, with a particular interest in growing roses. He was never happier than when he was at home with his charming wife Lil, who was his constant helpmeet in every kind of activity, and their two daughters. He died on 23 November 1966.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005847
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Brown, Sir Charles James Officer (1897 - 1984)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Sir Barry Jackson
Publication Date 2015-04-23 2018-05-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007100-E007199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379300379300
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Charles James Officer Brown was born in Melbourne on 24 September 1897, the third child of David Brown and Jamima (née Officer) whose grandfather, Sir Robert Officer, had emigrated as a ship's surgeon to Van Diemen's Land. He attended the Scotch College in Melbourne and proceeded to the Melbourne University Medical School where he attained first place in the final honours list and won prizes in surgery, obstetrics and gynaecology. He graduated in 1920. He spent two years as resident medical officer in the Royal Melbourne Hospital, gaining his MD before travelling to England where he spent two years in surgical training and acquiring the FRCS. He returned to Australia in 1925 when he endured several years of impecunity and anxiety without any paid hospital appointment. In 1929, the same year he was appointed surgeon to outpatients at the Alfred Hospital, he was found to have pulmonary tuberculosis, a disease that then had an exceedingly poor prognosis. Treatment consisted of rest, fresh air and hope. Officer Brown lived in virtual isolation for nearly two years in an open air pavilion in the garden before he was sufficiently well to resume practice in 1931. This personal experience of pulmonary tuberculosis undoubtedly shaped the direction of his future career. In September 1934, after practising on animals, he successfully performed a pulmonary lobectomy on a nineteen-year-old girl suffering from bronchiectasis and from this foundation he built his subsequent outstanding surgical career, first in pulmonary surgery and then in cardiac surgery. At the end of the second world war he toured the United States and visited Dr Alfred Blalock where he first heard about a new surgical concept of a shunt operation for the relief of Fallot's tetralogy. After returning to Melbourne he was appointed thoracic surgeon to the Alfred Hospital and after work in the animal laboratory carried out his first shunt operation for Fallot's tetralogy in October 1947. As the demand for surgical treatment for pulmonary tuberculosis and bronchiectasis fell away in the 1950s, the emphasis of his work swung towards cardiac surgery and he became one of the leading cardiac surgeons in Australia. He established open heart surgery in 1956, the year before his sixtieth birthday when he retired from the staff of the Alfred Hospital. He continued work at the Austin Hospital for another ten years. For many years he was responsible for leading a thoracic operating team out to Port Moresby, Papua, where he would perform all the necessary chest surgery for which in the 1950s there was no provision in New Guinea. He had a delightful relationship with all his staff and was a most friendly, warm hearted host to visitors. Officer Brown was an active member of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, being a member of Council between 1956 and 1968. In 1969 he was created Knight Bachelor for his services to medicine. In private life he was a humble man who made light of his enormous achievements. He wrote many important articles on thoracic and cardiac surgery but he himself claimed that none of them had lasting value. He enjoyed golf, being President of the Melbourne Club in 1968, and dry fly-fishing. He died on 22 August 1984 at the age of 86, and was survived by his wife, Esme, and his two daughters Susan and Caroline.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007117
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Thompson, Vernon Cecil (1905 - 1995)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-08
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008300-E008399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380576380576
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Vernon Thompson ('VCT') was born at Tutshill, Tidenham, Gloucestershire on 17 September 1905, his father, Cecil Charles Brandon Thompson, being a general practitioner and his mother, Dorothy Christian, née Ford, the daughter of a solicitor. He went to Seafield School, Bexhill-on-Sea, and then on to Monmouth School, from where he won a foundation scholarship and leaving exhibition to Cardiff University. He then went to St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School and after qualifying MRCS LRCP in 1929 went on to resident house appointments at St Bartholomew's and qualified MB BS London in 1932, when he had finished these posts. Between 1932 and 1937 he was first assistant to the surgical unit at St Bartholomew's and in 1937 he won the Dorothy Temple Cross Travelling Fellowship, which took him to Vienna and Ann Arbor, Michigan. During his surgical training he was particularly influenced by Harold Wilson and Geoffrey Keynes at St Bartholomew's and John Alexander at Ann Arbor Hospital, Michigan. After the period spent abroad he was appointed surgeon to the London Chest Hospital in 1938, a post that he held until 1970, and also in 1938 he was appointed first assistant to the department of thoracic surgery at the London Hospital, where he was particularly influenced by Tudor Edwards. In 1946 he was appointed full surgeon to the department of thoracic surgery at the London Hospital. During the war and in the immediate post-war period he was surgeon to the EMS sector hospital at Harefield throracic surgical unit, where he worked with Holmes Sellors, d'Abreu and others. He also held various other consulting thoracic surgical appointments to the North East Regional Hospital Board, London County Council, Preston Hall, Maidstone, West London Hospital and the King Edward VII Hospital, Windsor. His connections with the Royal College of Surgeons included routine postgraduate lectures by invitation and membership of the College's Committee on Higher Surgical Training. He was chairman of the Advisory Committee for Thoracic Surgery between 1966 and 1970 and President of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland between 1966 and 1967. He was a member of the Board of Governors of the London Hospital between 1948 and 1957 and of the Hospitals for Diseases of the Chest between 1948 and 1960. As a surgeon VCT had the reputation of being a hard taskmaster and at times overbearing to his junior staff, but made significant contributions to surgery for carcinoma of the oesophagus and tumours of the lung, with important publications in both subjects. His qualities as a surgical opinion were probably best seen in the pre-chemotherapy days in the management of pulmonary tuberculosis and he performed many thoracoplasties without mortality. He invented a knife for closed mitral valvotomy. In 1948 he became, with the fourteen other thoracic surgeons in Britain, a member of Brown's Club, so called because it met annually at Brown's Hotel in London, and this club was the forerunner of a series of similar clubs set up by peer groups in the specialty in the years that followed. The members of Brown's Club therefore set the pattern for a most important development in the field of cardiothoracic surgery in post-war Britain, with international connections. In 1942 he married Jean Frances Ardea Hilary and they had a son, Nicholas, and a daughter, Jean. In his youth, VCT played rugby football and enjoyed skiing and golf, and in later years fishing, shooting and gardening. He died on 27 November 1995 survived by his son and daughter, his wife having pre-deceased him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008393
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Bates, Michael (1917 - 1985)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-04-17
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007100-E007199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379294379294
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Michael Bates, the second son and youngest of three children of Tom Bates, a surgeon, was born in Worcester in July 1917. There were strong surgical roots in the family, his father being surgeon to the Worcester Royal Infirmary for 34 years, while his paternal grandfather - another Tom Bates - and an uncle, Mark Bates, had also been surgeons to the Infirmary. Michael's mother was 42 when he was born and he had a relatively lonely childhood as his siblings were much older. Moreover he had been born with a sightless left eye and, at the age of six, due to what would now be regarded as quite needless anxiety that the left eye might damage its healthy fellow, the blind eye was removed. At the age of seven he went to Aymestry School where the accent was on discipline, fair play, games and the study of wildlife. Indeed he was so happy there that he ultimately directed that his ashes should be scattered on the school cricket field. His education continued at Radley School, where despite the missing eye, he became an excellent cricketer and captained the first eleven. He then followed his father and grandfather to St Bartholomew's Hospital where he captained the first cricket team and qualified in 1941. After a surgical house job and registrar appointment with J E H Roberts at Bart's, he served in the RAMC in the Far East from 1945 to 1948 before returning to O S Tubbs' unit in the Bart's sector hospital at St Albans, and then at the Brompton Hospital for further training in thoracic surgery with O S Tubbs and Russell (later Lord) Brock. He completed the final FRCS in 1949 and was appointed consultant thoracic surgeon at North Middlesex and Broomfield (Colchester) Hospitals in 1952. At North Middlesex he developed an excellent regional thoracic centre, building upon the earlier work of Ivor Lewis who had also done general surgery. Closed cardiac surgery was also undertaken but, to his regret, he was never able to develop open cardiac work there. It was some compensation to him that he was later appointed thoracic surgeon to the Royal Northern Hospital in 1969, and was invited to join the Royal Free Hospital staff in 1979. His inexhaustible energy in his earlier years at North Middlesex and Colchester had enabled him to collect thoracic patients from a large part of the then North East Metropolitan region, and as a result he was able to give a notable Hunterian lecture in 1980, based upon no less than 2430 personal thoracotomies for bronchial carcinoma, possibly the largest personal series ever published. He was a regular participant in hospital clinical meetings and ran a popular thoracic surgical course for the final FRCS at North Middlesex Hospital. Despite his monocular vision he never had the slightest difficulty in operating and, more remarkably, he was able to strike a fast moving cricket ball with skill. Bates was President of the Thoracic Society in 1980, and of the Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons in 1982, the year of his retirement from the NHS. It was a source of bitter disappointment to him that the fine thoracic unit which he had developed at North Middlesex Hospital was closed down shortly afterwards. At about this time he developed peritonitis from a perforated carcinoma of the rectosigmoid region and had a succession of four abdominal operations which he withstood with calm and courage during the last eighteen months of his life. He had recently completed the editing of a book on bronchial carcinoma which was published in 1984. During his early resident appointments he had married Jean Young, a Bart's nurse, but they were divorced nine years later. There were two sons of that marriage, the elder of whom, a fourth generation doctor and the third surgical "Tom", is now a general surgeon at the William Harvey Hospital in Kent. Following the second world war, Michael married another Bart's nurse, Nancy Cranston Brown, by whom he had four daughters, the second of whom qualified at Bart's and is now practising ophthalmology. In the last year of his life, he gave his second daughter in marriage, spent four months at his holiday home in Cyprus, visited his second son in California and attended his youngest daughter's graduation at Durham just six weeks before his death. When he died at his home on 17 August 1985, aged 68, he was survived by his first and second wives and by his six children. Following his cremation his ashes were scattered on the cricket field at his old preparatory school. A Thanksgiving service was held at the Priory Church of St Bartholomew-the-Great on 2 November 1985 when the address was given by Sir Reginald Murley, KBE, TD, past President of the College.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007111
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Schrire, Theodore (1906 - 1991)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-01 2015-12-10
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008300-E008399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380493380493
Occupation Casualty surgeon Accident and emergency surgeon General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details The following obitiuary was published in volume eight of Plarr's Lives of the Fellows: Theodore Schrire, nicknamed 'Toddy', was born on 6 November 1906 in Cape Town. He matriculated at the age of sixteen, afterwards attaining his MA from the University of Cape Town, where he received the medal in physiology in 1925. He qualified MB ChB in 1930, and obtained his FRCS in London in 1933. He subsequently studied at the Mayo Clinic, and under Chevalier Jackson, who stimulated his interest in thoracic surgery. He went on to broaden his interests, studying orthopaedics at the Allgemeines Krankenhaus in Vienna, but soon left because of the prevailing anti-semitic sentiments. He returned to Cape Town in 1935 as a general surgeon in private practice, and was attached to the department of surgery at the University of Cape Town Medical School under Professor Saint. In 1938 he married Sylvia Sohn, and together they returned to Europe where under Professor Semb in Norway he pursued his studies in thoracic surgery, a discipline he would ultimately pioneer in Cape Town. He published several papers in local and international journals on this topic. In 1943 Schrire convened the first meeting of the Association of Surgeons of South Africa. Here, in collaboration with A G Sweetapple and Marcus Cole-Rous, he presented a proposed constitution for a College of Surgeons of South Africa. He started the Head and Neck Clinic at Groote Schuur Hospital and soon became renowned for his heroic and aggressive surgery in this field. In 1955 he was awarded the Hamilton-Bailey medal of the Medical Association of South Africa. In March 1956, in his prime at the age of 49 years, Schrire was struck down by a stroke. Unable to perform active surgery he was appointed assistant editor to Dr T Shaddick-Higgins of the *South African Medical Journal*, and subsequently to the joint medical staff in charge of the casualty department at Groote Schuur Hospital. There, he supervised the junior staff, at the same time publishing numerous papers, culminating this work by editing two books: *Emergencies: casualty organisation and treatment* in 1962, and *Surgical emergencies: diagnoses and management* in 1972. In 1966 Schrire published *Hebrew Amulets*, still recognised today as the definitive work on this topic. He was equally renowned for his collection of netsukes and received international recognition. Throughout his life, Schrire was a serious collector of these, together with amulets, maps of Africa and Palestine, Judaica and a variety of literary works. In 1971, at the age of 65, Schrire retired from his surgical career and spent much time pursuing his interests in other fields. He was widely recognised as a scholar and academic. His temperament, described by his wife as 'fiery', may have proved intimidating to some, but to his family and close friends it was a constant stimulus to continued intellectual pursuits. He died on 6 May 1991, survived by his wife and four daughters, Tamar, Carmel, Sharon and Gail. The following obitiuary was published in volume nine of Plarr's Lives of the Fellows: 'Toddy' Schrire was born in Cape Town on 6 November 1906, the son of Max Mordechai Schrire and Rebecca Mauerberger. He was educated at the South African College School and studied medicine at the University of Cape Town, winning a medal in physiology. After qualifying, he went to London, passed the conjoint, and took the FRCS. Later he travelled extensively, visiting the Mayo Clinic, studying under Chevalier Jackson, and the Algemeine Krankenhaus in Vienna. He decided to leave Austria because of the prevailing anti-semitic climate. He returned to Cape Town in 1935 as a general surgeon in private practice, and was attached to the department of surgery under Saint. In 1938, he married Sylvia Sohn, and together they returned to Europe, where he studied under Semb in Norway. He resolved to specialise in cardiothoracic surgery, a discipline which he pioneered in South Africa. In 1943, Toddy convened the first meeting of the Association of Surgeons of South Africa, from which evolved a College of Surgeons of South Africa. He started the head and neck clinic at Groote Schuur Hospital and was soon famous for his aggressive surgery in this field. In 1955, he was awarded the Hamilton Bailey medal of the Medical Association of South Africa. In 1956, when only 49, Toddy was afflicted by a stroke. Giving up operating, he became assistant editor of the *South African Medical Journal* and was put in charge of the casualty department at Groote Schuur. There he published innumerable papers, supervised the junior staff, and wrote two textbooks. He had several hobbies. He was a respected collector of Japanese netsukes and Hebrew amulets, hobbies he shared with Sylvia. He retired in 1971. He died in Cape Town on 6 May 1991, leaving four daughters, three of whose names were Mrs Sharon Godfrey, Mrs Carmel Steiger and Mrs Gail Flesch.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008310
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Collis, John Leigh (1911 - 2003)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-09-23
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000000-E000099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372229372229
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Jack Collis was a pioneering thoracic surgeon. He was born in Harborne, Birmingham, on 14 July 1911, the son of Walter Thomas Collis, an industrial chemist, and Dora Charton Reay. His choice of medicine was greatly influenced by his local GP and his two medical uncles, one of whom was a professor of medicine at Cardiff. He was educated at Shrewsbury School and studied medicine at Birmingham. There he was a member of the athletic club and captained the hockey team. He was equally outstanding as a scholar, winning the Queen’s scholarship for three years running, and the Ingleby scholarship and Priestley Smith prize in his final year, together with gold medals in clinical surgery and medicine. He graduated in 1935 with first class honours. He was house physician to K D Wilkinson at Birmingham General Hospital and then house surgeon to B J Ward at the Queen’s Hospital. He went on to be surgical registrar to H H Sampson at the General Hospital, before becoming a resident surgical officer at the Brompton Chest Hospital in London under Tudor Edwards and Clement Price Thomas. The outbreak of war saw him back in Birmingham as resident surgical officer at the General Hospital. By July 1940 he was surgeon to the Barnsley Hall Emergency hospital, which received Blitz casualties from Birmingham and Coventry. He was in charge of the chest unit for the next four years, during which time he wrote a thesis on the metastatic cerebral abscess associated with suppurative conditions of the lung, where he showed the route of infection via the vertebral veins. This won him an MD with honours, as well as a Hunterian professorship in 1944. In February 1944 he joined the RAMC to command the No 3 Surgical Team for Chest Surgery, taking his team through Europe into Germany shortly after D-day, for which he was mentioned in despatches. From Germany he was posted to India to receive the anticipated casualties in the Far East. He ended his war service as a Lieutenant Colonel. At the end of the war he applied to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, from his posting in India, with a glowing reference from Tudor Edwards. He was appointed initially as a general surgeon, though he was soon engaged mainly in thoracic surgery, especially thoracoplasty for tuberculosis, and spent much time travelling between sanatoria in Warwick, Burton-on-Trent and Malvern. With the advent of cardiac surgery, Jack was responsible for a successful series of mitral valvotomies and was one of the first to remove a tumour from within the cavity of the left atrium, using a sharpened dessert spoon and a piece of wire gauze. Later he withdrew from open heart surgery to concentrate on the surgery of the oesophagus. He became celebrated for three advances in the surgery of the oesophagus – the Collis gastroplasty for patients with reflux, the Collis repair of the lower oesophagus and, above all, a successful technique for oesophagectomy. In this his mortality and leakage rates were half those of his contemporaries. He attributed his success to the use of fine steel wire: his assistants attributed it to his outstanding surgical technique. He was Chairman of the regional advisory panel for cardiothoracic surgery, an honorary professor of thoracic surgery at the University of Birmingham, and was President of the Thoracic Society and the Society of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgeons. He was Chairman of the medical advisory committee at the Birmingham United Hospitals from 1961 to 1963, and Chairman of the planning committee from 1963 to 1965. He trained a generation of thoracic surgeons whose friendship he retained, along with those medical orderlies who served with him during the war. Vehemently proud of Birmingham, he devoted much of his retirement to promoting the city. He married Mavis Haynes in 1941. They had a holiday bungalow in Wales, where he enjoyed walking, gardening and fishing. They had four children, Nigel, Gilly, Christopher and Mark, two of whom entered medicine. He died in Moseley, Birmingham on 4 February 2003.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000042
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Barrett, Norman Rupert (1903 - 1979)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-11-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006200-E006299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378482378482
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Norman Barrett was born in Adelaide, Australia, on 16 May 1903. He was one of the great pioneers of thoracic surgery. After spending his early years in Australia he came to England and was educated at Eton where he was distinguished in both academic and athletic fields. He proceeded to Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating with first class honours in 1925 and then went to St Thomas's Hospital and qualified in 1928. He then held resident house appointments there, and obtained the coveted post of resident assistant surgeon. The foundations were truly laid for a great surgical career and a Rockefeller Travelling Fellowship enabled him to visit the USA and spend a fruitful time at the Mayo Clinic, where he formed lasting friendships and gained valuable experience. He was elected to the surgical staff at St Thomas's Hospital in 1935 and developed an increasing interest in chest diseases and thoracic surgery, making a special study of disorders of the lower oesophagus, and soon was recognised as an authority in this field. He was appointed to the surgical staff of the Brompton Hospital, becoming a member of an important group of thoracic surgeons who travelled extensively to meet the increasing demands for the surgical treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. Norman Barrett visited, usually at weekends, hospitals and sanatoria in Cornwall and Wales. From his experience in South Wales he became acknowledged as an authority on hydatid disease of the lungs. During the second world war he was a consultant adviser to the Emergency Medical Service and in 1944 he was appointed consultant thoracic surgeon to King Edward VII Sanatorium, Midhurst, and the Ministry of Pensions. Norman Barrett was a brilliant teacher and attracted undergraduates and post-graduates in great numbers to hear him lecture or talk informally. He was an excellent writer and was the first surgical editor of the new journal *Thorax* from 1946 to 1971 and took endless trouble with its contributions. He admitted that his choice of words and literary style owed a great deal to the influence of his wife, Betty - a well known writer. Norman's own publications are outstanding and widely read for they are the embodiment of precision, authority and experience. He was an examiner for the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Birmingham and Khartoum. For many years he was a member of the Court of Examiners of the Royal College of Surgeons, eventually becoming its Chairman. In 1963 he was elected to the Council of the Royal College of Surgeons and for sixteen years he played a very attractive and valuable part in its work. For the last two years of this period he was Vice-President of the College. He was appointed CBE for his outstanding work. Norman Barrett had an international reputation as evidenced by his honorary membership of many overseas societies and his election as President of the Association of Thoracic Surgeons and of the Thoracic Society. Amidst all the success and international admiration Norman Barrett was basically a humble man, genuinely modest about his important achievements and surgical contributions, and always seeking how he could do better. He had other interests too, for he was an excellent draughtsman and painter and he illustrated many of his publications, the letters NRB being plainly visible in one corner. He loved sailing and the sea and this is clearly shown in some of his marine paintings. In addition he was an historian and delivered an admirable Vicary Lecture, entitled *The last illnesses of Henry VIII*. Norman had a happy home life with his wife Betty and their two daughters in their historic house on Richmond Green, where so many friends and colleagues from home and abroad received a warm and memorable welcome. Their hospitality was renowned. During his last few years Norman's health was impaired by disability, but his faculties and intelligence remained undimmed. He died on 8 January 1979, aged 76 years.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006299
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Gibbons, John Robert Pelham (1926 - 1999)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-10-30
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008600-E008699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380803380803
Occupation Accident and emergency surgeon General practitioner Military surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details John Gibbons was born in Moseley, Warwickshire, on 26 November 1926. His father, Leonard Norman Gibbons, who had been severely gassed in the trenches during the First World War, later became legal adviser to the Birmingham Gas Board. His mother was Gladys Elizabeth née Smith, a secretary. John was educated at Moseley Grammar School and Pates' School, Cheltenham, before enlisting in the ranks of the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry in 1944. He was then commissioned in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment and, while on active service with them in Palestine, he had his first experience of battlefield casualties. He later transferred to the Guards Battalion of the Parachute Regiment, leaving Palestine for Egypt by road on the last day of the British Mandate on 14 May 1948. On completing his service, he went to Leeds Medical School, where he gained prizes in anaesthesia and clinical medicine and won the Brotherton scholarship, qualifying in 1954. He then worked as a registrar at Leeds General Hospital and also helped his brothers-in-law run their general practice. He obtained the FRCS diploma in 1960 and later, when senior registrar at the National Heart Hospital, he was one of the team who carried out the first heart transplant in the United Kingdom. He was appointed locum senior lecturer and consultant at King's College Hospital, following which he became a consultant in accident and emergency medicine at the Royal Free Hospital. This led on to his definitive appointment as surgeon to the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast. He managed to combine his medical career with territorial services in the Army, from 1948 to the day of his death. In Northern Ireland he was honorary surgeon to the Army and medical officer of the 10th Battalion of the Ulster Defence Regiment. He also served with the Royal Tank Regiment, the Warwickshire Yeomanry, Leeds Rifles and the Parachute Regiment, where in the late 1960's he commanded a company until it was decided he should be transferred to the RAMC. He was president of the Northern Ireland branch of the Parachute Regiment Association. During the Iran/Iraq war of the 1980s, when Britain was supporting Iraq, Gibbons was asked to go to Basra to help treat the wounded and organise the evacuation of some casualties to British hospitals. He was subsequently decorated by Iraq for his work during the conflict. He served as consultant thoracic surgeon to the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast between 1977 and 1993, becoming the pre-eminent British authority on crush, blast and missile wounds of the chest. This led to the award of a Hunterian Professorship in 1984. He published widely on chest injuries and oesophageal surgery, enjoyed teaching his juniors and acknowledged the influence of Digby Chamberlain and John Goligher in both his training and in his surgical practice. In his younger days, John had played rugby football, gaining his university colours at Headingley, and also playing for Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire and Derby, as well as the Territorial Army. He was also interested in shooting, travelling, railways, good food and wine. In 1952 he married Marie-Jeanne Brookes, a teacher, and they had four sons and two daughters, two of the sons being doctors.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008620
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Nelson, Henry Philbrick (1902 - 1936)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2013-09-04
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004300-E004399
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/376563376563
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born at Hawkes Bay, New Zealand on 28 August 1902, the second of the three sons of George Nelson, civil engineer, and Mabel Price, his wife. He was educated at Fount Row, Surrey, at Harrow from Easter 1916 to Midsummer 1918, and at Caius College, Cambridge, from Michaelmas term 1920. He graduated in 1923 after being placed in the second class of Part I of the Natural Sciences Tripos. He then entered the medical school of St Bartholomew's Hospital, and in due course was appointed house surgeon to William McAdam Eccles. He was appointed Luther Holden research scholar at the end of his year of office, and became surgical registrar at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital. Deciding to devote himself to thoracic surgery he served as demonstrator of anatomy at St Bartholomew's Hospital and worked assiduously at the anatomy of the tracheo-bronchial lymphatic glands. He also studied the later stages of wounds of the chest at Queen Mary's Hospital, Roehampton. As surgical scholar of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain he served for a year as instructor of surgery in the thoracic surgical unit under Dr John Alexander at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and visited Canada. On his return to England he was appointed chief clinical assistant to J E H Roberts at St Bartholomew's Hospital, and assistant at the Brompton Hospital for Diseases of the Chest. In 1932 he was the Ernest Hart memorial scholar of the British Medical Association, and whilst holding the scholarship did valuable work on postural drainage in bronchiectasis and lung abscess. In 1933 he was elected assistant surgeon to the Brompton Hospital, and as thoracic surgeon to the London County Council was placed in charge of a special clinic at St Andrew's Hospital, Bow. In 1935 he became surgeon to the Papworth Village settlement for the tuberculous at Cambridge and to the Metropolitan Hospital in London. In April 1936 he was elected assistant surgeon to the London Hospital. He was also thoracic surgeon to the Brighton borough council and to the Middlesex county council. In none of these positions did he ever spare himself but always worked to the uttermost of his strength, with the result that he had no resisting power and fell a victim to a virulent streptococcal infection from a slight operation wound. He died in St Bartholomew's Hospital on 24 June 1936, aged 33. He married Kathleen, daughter of Alan Sullivan of Sheerland House, Pluckley, Kent, on 22 January 1927. She survived him with two daughters. Nelson's early death was a great loss to the surgery of the chest, which he had already advanced very considerably. He was a man of original mind, a great organizer, and a brilliant operator. As an individual he was direct of purpose, enthusiastic, of transparent honesty, modest, and extremely friendly. Publications: Bilharziasis, limited symptomatically to the urinary tract. *Newcastle med J* 1928, 9, 52. Case of impending ischaemic contracture. *Lancet*, 1930, 2, 795. Irradiation of tracheobronchial lymphatic glands in treatment of carcinoma of lung. *Ibid* 1930, 2, 1118. Experimental Coil infection in urinary tract of rabbits. *Trans Med Soc Lond* 1930, 53, 266. Accessory lobe of azygos vein, with G Simon. *Brit med J* 1931, 1, 9. Tracheo-bronchial lymphatic glands. *J Anat* 1932, 66, 228. Causation and prevention of chronic empyemas. *St Bart's Hosp J* 1932, 39, 170. Rib retractor for major thoracotomies. *Lancet*, 1932, 2, 1003. Subclavian aneurysm following fracture of clavicle. *St Bart's Hosp Rep* 1932, 65, 219. Chronic empyemata. *Post-grad med J* 1933, 10, 462. Pulmonary lobectomy, technique and report of ten cases, with J E H Roberts. *Brit J Surg* 1933, 21, 277. Collapse therapy in bronchiectasis; a warning. *Brit med J* 1934, 1, 58. Postural drainage of lungs. *Ibid* 1934, 2, 251. Intrathoracic neoplasms. *Post-grad med J* 1935, 11, 25. A case of delayed metastatic sarcoma of the pleura, illustrating the diagnostic value of artificial pneumothorax, with W Bromme and T Findley. *Amer J Cancer*, 1935, 24, 334. John Melly; address at the memorial service St Bartholomew's-the-Less. *St Bart's Hosp J* 1936, 43, 161.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004380
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Romanis, William Hugh Cowie (1889 - 1972)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-10-06
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006000-E006099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378273378273
Occupation General surgeon Lawyer Thoracic surgeon
Details Born at Godalming on 8 November 1889, the elder son of the Rev William Francis Romanis, Preacher of the Charterhouse, and Annie Ellen Cowie, he was educated at Charterhouse where he was a scholar and became head of the school. Going up to Trinity College, Cambridge as a mathematical scholar he obtained a first class in part I of the Mathematical Tripos, followed by a first class in part I of the Natural Sciences Tripos in 1911. Becoming interested in medicine he proceeded to St Thomas's Hospital for his clinical studies, qualifying with the Conjoint Diploma in 1914. Before qualification he obtained medicine and surgery prizes in 1913 and, after qualification, was appointed house surgeon for six months followed by six months as a casualty officer, after which he was gazetted in the RAMC. He served in France at No 6 and No 44 Casualty Clearing Stations, returning before the end of the war to take up the post of surgical registrar - at the time there was only one - to be followed by that of resident assistant surgeon at St Thomas's which by that time was desperately short of surgical manpower. In 1919 at the age of 30 he was elected to the consultant staff and by his outstanding ability rapidly built up an ever widening consulting practice embracing many smaller, peripheral hospitals, in particular Wrotham, Sevenoaks, Woking, Kingston, Wimbledon, St Anthony's Cheam and Okehampton. He succeeded Morriston Davies as consulting surgeon at the City of London Hospital for Diseases of the Heart and Lungs in Victoria Park and was one of the early pioneers in thoracic surgery. A man of remarkable intellectual capacity, he was also a dextrous and rapid operator and was one of the first to undertake the surgical treatment of exophthalmic goitre, at that time only possible under twilight sleep and local anaesthesia. A popular teacher with a ready wit, he was much sought after as an examiner. He was a member of the Court of Examiners of the College and also acted for the Universities of Cambridge, London and Glasgow. At one time he was a surgeon to the Tooting Neurological Hospital and was a Fellow of the Association of Neurological Surgeons, having for a period been associated with Sir Percy Sargent at St Thomas's. He collaborated with P H Mitchiner in a highly successful textbook of surgery and was the author of numerous surgical papers. Legal processes had always fascinated him and he was a JP and chairman of the bench at Godalming for many years. To increase his legal status he was called to the Bar in 1954 at the age of 64, in which year he retired from the staff of St Thomas's. His interests were wide outside the field of surgery. At one time he was county surgeon of Surrey in the St John Ambulance Brigade. An eminent Freemason, he attained high rank and was active in the interests of the craft, particularly the Masonic Hospital. An early and enthusiastic motorist, "Hugo" as he was always known at St Thomas's, was driving sports cars at a time when they were few in number and hard to come by. He was also a model railway enthusiast, maintaining an extensive and highly efficient railway in the garden of his country home. He married in 1916 Dorothy Elizabeth daughter of Rev Canon Robert Burnett, Chancellor of Ferns Cathedral, Co Wexford and they had one son, a medical practitioner, and two daughters. He died at his house in Godalming on 25 January 1972 aged 82 survived by his widow, son and a married daughter.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006090
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Price Thomas, Sir Clement (1893 - 1973)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-09-24
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006000-E006099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378209378209
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Clement Price Thomas was born on 22 November 1893 at Abercam, Monmouthshire, where his father was a merchant. His mother's father was a minister of religion. He was the youngest of a large family and went to school first at Newport High School and later at Caterham School whence he passed on to the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire. He then entered the Cardiff Medical School where he won the Hughes Medal in anatomy, and an entrance scholarship to the Westminster Hospital Medical School for his clinical work. During the first world war he served as a private in the 32nd Field Ambulance from 1914-1918 in Gallipoli, Macedonia and Palestine. Price Thomas qualified with the Conjoint Board Diploma in 1921 and held several junior appointments at the Westminster Hospital and passed the FRCS in 1923. He was surgical registrar at Westminster for 3 years and in 1927 was elected to the staff of the hospital. During his period of training he was influenced by Ernest Rock Carling, G T Mullally and Tudor Edwards who gave him his introduction to thoracic surgery which was to become the specialty in which he excelled, and which ultimately gained him world-wide recognition, as evidence by the numerous honorary degrees awarded by universities at home and abroad. In addition to his duties at the Westminster Hospital Price Thomas was appointed surgeon to the Brompton Hospital for Diseases of the Chest. He also served as consultant in thoracic surgery to the Army and the Royal Air Force, and consultant to the King Edward VII Sanatorium, Midhurst, to the Royal National Hospital, Ventnor, and to the Welsh National Memorial Association South Wales, and was adviser in thoracic surgery to the Ministry of Health. When in 1951 it was decided that King George VI needed surgical treatment for a diseased lung, Price Thomas undertook the operation, the successful outcome of which was rewarded by the Knighthood of the Royal Victorian Order. Such clinical appointments constitute but one area of activity in his remarkable career, another of which included his contributions to many academic bodies, prominent among them being the Royal College of Surgeons which he served as a member of the Court of Examiners from 1948-1952; as a member of the Council from 1952-1964, being Vice-President in 1962-1964, as Tudor Edwards Memorial Lecturer in 1959, Vicary Lecturer in 1960, and Bradshaw Lecturer in 1963. He was also elected President of the Association of Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland, of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, of the Royal Society of Medicine, of the British Medical Association, of the Welsh National School of Medicine, and of the Medical Protection Society. These honours came to him partly, of course, because of his capability as a leader, but also because of his innate modesty and natural good humour which endeared him to all who knew him well. In 1925 he married Ethel Doris, daughter of Mortimer Ricks of Paignton, South Devon, and he and Dorrie were a devoted couple whose warm friendship was enjoyed by Clem's colleagues and acquaintances. They had two sons, one of whom became a Fellow of the College. In what little spare time he had he enjoyed a game of golf and was interested in photography and reading. Latterly he suffered from the lung disease for which he had treated so many patients, and which he bore for several years with exemplary courage and patience. He died on 19 March 1973, aged 79, and his wife and sons survived him.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006026
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Linton, John Steuart Alexander (1916 - 2001)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-11-17
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E008000-E008999/E008700-E008799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/380926380926
Occupation General practitioner Thoracic surgeon
Details John Steuart Alexander Linton was a consultant surgeon at Nottingham. He was the son of the Very Reverend J H Linton, a missionary who became a bishop in Persia. His mother, Alicia Aldous, had qualified in 1908 from the Royal Free Hospital and was then senior resident in Isfahan Hospital. She was on her way home from Persia when John was born in the Khyber Pass on 29 January 1916. He used to joke that he was born "off the back of a camel". He was the second of four sons, who were all sent back to school in England at the age of four. He went to Repton in 1928, where Geoffrey Fisher (later Archbishop of Canterbury) was headmaster. Mrs Fisher was Linton's cousin, so John was beaten more than most to show no favouritism. John injured an eye playing cricket and was unable to work for nearly a year; he was given a camera and a bicycle and let loose in Derbyshire, which he regarded as a thoughtful and imaginative plan. He continued to be an enthusiastic cricketer, and became an excellent swimmer and tennis player. He went to St Bartholomew's in 1934, where he was taught anatomy by Oz Tubbs, an experience he always valued. His father was now assistant bishop of Birmingham and John did a few GP locums around the area until he joined the RAF at the beginning of the war. He was posted to Canada in 1941 and returned in 1942 as senior medical officer at RAF Elsham, a bomber station. There he worked on the problem of calculating oxygen requirements during the long flights in Lancasters to Germany and Italy, research which required him to fly in the aircraft himself. After the war he intended to return to general practice, but his mother persuaded him to work for the FRCS, so he returned to Bart's as a houseman, passing the final FRCS along with Peter Jones (the founder of Pete's Club) and Johnnie Weaver in 1948. He then did junior jobs in Carshalton and Hammersmith, where he thought Ian Aird was the best teacher he had ever known. Choosing to specialise in thoracic surgery, he worked at the Brompton and the London Chest Hospitals, until he was found to have a tuberculous focus in the lung and was sent out of London to Southampton, as senior house officer to Paul Chinn. When his chest was cured, he returned to London to work for Holmes Sellors, Vernon Thompson, Geoffrey Flavell and Price Thomas. After Price Thomas operated on King George VI and was knighted, John became his registrar. Later he worked for Lord Brock, through whom he was appointed as a consultant in Nottingham. He used to recall an incident when he was assisting Brock and was told off for using the wrong instrument. "But it is common practice, sir", he said. Brock replied, "So is adultery Linton, but it don't make it right". In Nottingham he built up a reputation for patent ductus arteriosus and was an active member of Pete's Club. He married Margaret Goode in 1943 and had two daughters (one called Alexandra), neither of whom went into medicine. In retirement he did a few local locums to eke out his pension, and spent much time gardening in his cottage in Coulston, where he was chairman of his parish council. He died on 3 April 2001 in Devizes.
Resource Identifier RCS: E008743
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Davies, Hugh Morriston (1879 - 1965)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-07-22
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E005000-E005999/E005600-E005699
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/377879377879
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Hugh Morriston Davies was born at Huntington on 10 August 1879, son of William Morriston Davies (MB Ed 1873), who was in general practice there. He was educated at Winchester, Trinity College, Cambridge, and University College Hospital, London, qualifying with the Conjoint Diploma in 1903. He won the Fellowes Gold Medal in Clinical Medicine and the Erichsen Prize in Surgery at UCH Medical School, proceeded to both MCh and MD at Cambridge, and took the Fellowship in 1908. He was appointed an assistant surgeon to his hospital in 1909 before his thirtieth birthday. While serving as assistant to Sir Victor Horsley he published important research in 1907 on sensory changes in the face, following Horsley's Gasserian ganglion operation for trigeminal neuralgia. He also joined Wilfred Trotter, a few years his senior, in experiments on themselves, using each other as controls, when they cut various skin nerves to study the innervation of the skin and altered sensibility during nerve regeneration. Their results, published in the *Review of neurology*, 1907, and the *Journal of physiology*, 1909, superseded the conclusions from similar experiments published in *Brain*, 1905, by Henry Head, W H R Rivers, and James Sherren. Davies was keenly alert to the newest advances, and studied the possibilities of radiology in the diagnosis of chest disease. He went to Berlin in 1910 to learn about the beginnings of thoracic surgery there and the new pressure chambers for anaesthesia in surgery of the lungs. During 1911 he introduced a positive pressure machine of his own design, and an artificial pneumothorax apparatus. In 1912 he performed the first thoracoplasty operation in Britain, and his patient lived on in good health for twenty-seven years. The same year he diagnosed a tumour of the lung by X-rays, and successfully removed it - the first such operation ever performed. In 1913 he tied the main pulmonary artery with success. Encouraged by Horsley and Trotter he introduced during the next four years many new intrathoracic surgical procedures with great success, while severely criticised by more conservative colleagues; at a professional meeting the chairman asked him not to speak, because a surgeon could have nothing to contribute to the discussion of tuberculosis. In January 1916 he suffered an accident which halted this career of brilliant achievement and further promise, when he was only thirty-six. During an emergency operation he was handed a cutgut suture which accidentally contained a glass splinter. The glass pierced the skin of his right hand, suppuration supervened, and his most eminent colleagues, both physicians and surgeons, gave very pessimistic opinions. Wilfred Trotter incised the hand and forearm, which prevented the spread of infection, but his right hand was permanently damaged and useless. He resigned from his hospital, and started to write a monograph on thoracic surgery. He heard in 1918 that the Vale of Clwyd Sanatorium was for sale. He bought it and settled there. In a comparatively short time he made it a centre for thoracic surgery attracting attention from all over the world. By 1921 he himself took up major surgery again, using his left hand. He was appointed the first thoracic surgeon to the Welsh Memorial Association for Tuberculosis, and consultant to many Welsh hospitals and to those in Cheshire and Lancashire. He was not only a brilliant and tireless worker himself, but a masterful organiser. At Wrightington Hospital he was at the centre of eight areas, under the Lancashire County Council, with a population of two million, dealing with the tuberculosis problems of his county, and held regular clinical conferences with his eight chief assistants. During the second world war he was consultant thoracic surgeon to the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force for the north west of England, organised arrangements for the treatment of both military and civilian chest casualties, and led and trained the North-West Chest Unit at Broadgreen Hospital, Liverpool, where he held a weekly conference with all his staff. Davies continued to work, operating, teaching, advising and writing, till he was eighty. He then retired to a remote cottage at Llanarmon near Mold in North Wales, where he cultivated a natural rock-garden. He was awarded the Weber-Parkes Prize by the Royal College of Physicians in 1954. He married Dorothy Lilian, daughter of Dr W L Courtney, and they had two daughters. He died at his country home on 4 February 1965 aged 85; Mrs Davies died on 15 October 1966 aged 88. Morriston Davies generously gave the College his autographed manuscript of Wilfred Trotter's famous book *The Instincts of the herd in peace and war*. Publications *Thoracic surgery*, 1919. Recent advances in the surgery of the lung and pleura. *Brit J Surg* 1923, 11, 228. *Pulmonary tuberculosis*, 1933.
Resource Identifier RCS: E005696
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Hardy, James Daniel (1918 - 2003)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2005-11-15 2007-08-09
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000100-E000199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372351372351
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details James Daniel Hardy was an organ transplant pioneer and the first chairman of the department of surgery and surgeon in chief at the University Medical Center, Jackson, Mississippi. Board certified by both the American Board of Surgery and the Board of Thoracic Surgery and a fellow of the American College of Surgeons, Hardy worked to improve medical and surgical care in Mississippi throughout his career of teaching, caring for patients and clinical research. Over 200 surgeons trained with him during his tenure as chairman of the department of surgery from 1955 to 1987. Born in Birmingham, Alabama, on 14 May 1918, the elder of twin boys, he was the son of Fred Henry Hardy, owner of a lime plant, and Julia Poyner Hardy, a schoolteacher. His early childhood was tough and frugal, thanks to the Depression. He was educated at Montevallo High School, where he played football for the school, and learned to play the trombone. He completed his premedical studies at the University of Alabama, where he excelled in German, and went on to the University of Pennsylvania to study medicine, and during his physiology course carried out a research project (on himself) to show that olive oil introduced into the duodenum would inhibit the production of gastric acid - an exercise which gave him a lifelong interest in research. At the same time he joined the Officers Training Corps. In his last year he published research into the effect of sulphonamide on wound healing. After receiving his MD he entered postgraduate training for a year as an intern and a resident in internal medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and also conducted research on circulatory physiology. Research became a vital part of his professional life. His military service in the second world war was with the 81st Field Hospital. In the New Year of 1945 he found himself in London, before crossing to France and the last months of the invasion of Germany. After VE Day his unit was sent out to the Far East, but when news arrived of the Japanese surrender his ship made a U-turn and they landed back in the United States. He returned to Philadelphia to complete his surgical residency under Isidor Ravdin. He was a senior Damon Runyon fellow in clinical research and was awarded a masters of medical science in physiological chemistry by the University of Pennsylvania in 1951 for his research on heavy water and the measurement of body fluids. That same year Hardy became an assistant professor of surgery and director of surgical research at the University of Tennessee College of Medicine at Memphis, later he was to become an associate professor, and continued in this position until 1955, when he became the first professor of surgery and chairman of the department of surgery at the newly established University of Mississippi Medical Center, School of Medicine, Jackson. As a surgeon charged with establishing an academic training programme, Hardy became known as a charismatic teacher and indefatigable physician. He also actively pursued and encouraged clinical research in the newly established department of surgery. His group’s years of research in the laboratory led to the first kidney autotransplant in man for high ureteral injury, and to advances in the then emerging field of human organ transplantation. The first lung transplant in man was performed at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in 1963 and in 1964 Hardy and his team carried out the first heart transplantation using a chimpanzee as a donor. Hardy authored, co-authored or edited more than 23 medical books, including two which became standard surgery texts, and published more than 500 articles and chapters in medical publications. He served on numerous editorial boards and as editor-in-chief of *The World Journal of Surgery*. He also produced a volume of autobiographical memoirs, *The Academic surgeon* (Mobile, Alabama, Magnolia Mansions Press, c.2002), which is a most readable and vivid account of the American residency system and its emphasis on research, which has been such a model for the rest of the world. Over the course of his career he served as president of the American College of Surgeons, the American Surgical Association, the International Surgical Society and the Society of University Surgeons and was a founding member of the International Surgical Group and the Society for Surgery of the Alimentary tract. He was an honorary fellow of the College, of the l’Académie Nationale de Médicine and l’Association Français de Chirurgie. The proceedings of the 1983 surgical forum of the American College of Surgeons was dedicated to Hardy, citing him as “…an outstanding educator, investigator, clinical surgeon and international leader.” In 1987 Hardy retired from the department of surgery and served in the Veteran’s Administration Hospital system as a distinguished VA physician from 1987 to 1990. He married Louise (Weezie) Scott Sams in 1949. They had four daughters: Louise, Julia Ann, Bettie and Katherine. He died on 19 February 2003. An annual James D Hardy lectureship has been established in his honour at the department of surgery, University Medical Center, Jackson.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000164
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Shenstone, Norman Strahan (1881 - 1970)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2014-10-14
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E006000-E006999/E006100-E006199
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/378309378309
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Norman Shenstone was born at Brantford, Ontario, on 18 April 1881, the second son and second child of Joseph Newton Shenstone, a manufacturer of farm machinery, and Eliza Hara, his wife. His primary education was in local schools of Brantford and Toronto, to which his family moved during his early boyhood. He received the degree of BA from the University of Toronto in 1901 following a general course in the humanities. He then entered the Medical School of Columbia University in New York and graduated with the degree of MD in 1905. He spent a further two years in New York City in postgraduate training at the New York Hospital and St Mary's Hospital for Children and then travelled abroad for further surgical study. He took the Conjoint Examination in London in 1909. He returned to Toronto in that same year to commence his surgical practice and was appointed demonstrator in anatomy and demonstrator in the department of surgery of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Toronto. The Professor and head of the department of surgery was Irving H Cameron, FRCS. His clinical appointment was to the staff of the Toronto General Hospital. After the outbreak of war he enlisted in the Canadian Army Medical Corps and was sent overseas in February, 1916, with the rank of Captain to join the staff of 16 Canadian General Hospital at Orpington. He was invalided home a year later but continued to serve on the staff of the Davisville Military Hospital in Toronto until the end of the war. He then rejoined the staff of the Toronto General Hospital and by 1920 was promoted to Assistant Professor and Head of a Surgical Service, a position he retained until 1946. During this time he served under two distinguished Professors of Surgery, Clarence Starr and W E Gallie. He showed great concern for the welfare of the disabled veterans of the armed forces and from 1919 until 1946 was a consultant surgeon to the hospital for veterans in Toronto. He was also a strong supporter of a small hospital operated by the Sisters of St John and was of great assistance to them in the planning and organization of the modern convalescent hospital which they established in Newtonbrook on the outskirts of Toronto when they decided to give up their general hospital in the city. The many veterans suffering from chronic empyema who came under his care stimulated his interest in thoracic surgery, of which he became a pioneer in Canada. In association with his colleague, Robert Janes, he developed the lung tourniquet in 1929. This simple instrument was the key to a technique which for the first time permitted excising of lobes or even whole lungs with relative safety for the patient. Although it was soon superseded by the more precise technique of hilar dissection, the tourniquet had given great impetus to the development of pulmonary resection. Shenstone also developed a technique for closure of bronchial fistulae by the use of a pedicle graft of intercostal muscle. However, he remained a general surgeon to the end of his career. His surgical technique was characterized by a direct and dexterous approach, devoid of flourishes. One of his outstanding qualities was the wisdom of his judgement both at the bedside and in the operating room. As a teacher he was at his best in the selection and guidance of young surgeons in training; many of the senior surgeons across Canada came under his instruction during the twenty-six years that he was head of a surgical division at the Toronto General Hospital. He was a kindly and generous man but intolerant of two things: any departure from strict honesty, or careless use of the English language. Although Shenstone wrote little he was much appreciated internationally for his pioneer contributions, particularly to thoracic surgery. In 1943 Sir Heneage Ogilvie on a war time trip to Canada conferred on him the Honorary Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England and in 1949 he delivered the Tudor Edwards Lecture on The treatment of bronchiectasis. In 1941 he was elected an Honorary Member of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery. When the American College of Surgeons was organized in 1913 he became a Charter Fellow and at the time of his death was one of only three surviving. He was a good tennis player and a fair golfer but his first love was the out of doors, the beauty of the Canadian woods and streams, and the quiet glide of a canoe over sparkling water, even a tough carry over a portage. He was a knowledgeable field naturalist and bird watcher. His death on 5 March 1970, followed a long and distressing illness which he bore with great fortitude. He married Amey Chase in 1911 and they had three children, of which the eldest, a daughter, died suddenly in early adult life. He is survived by his widow, by a daughter Barbara Fleury and a son, Strahan. His brother Allen, who survives him, had a long and distinguished career at Princeton University as a physicist. Publications: Experiences in pulmonary lobectomy, with R M Janes. *Canad med Ass J* 1932, 27, 138. Use of intercostal muscle in repair of bronchial fistulae. *Ann Surg* 1936, 104, 560. Experiences with total pneumonectomy. *J Thorac Surg* 1942, 11, 405.
Resource Identifier RCS: E006126
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
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First Title value, for Searching Roberts, James Ernest Heleme (1881 - 1948)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2013-10-23
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004500-E004599
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/376705376705
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born 23 August 1881 at West Bromwich, Staffordshire, son of James Roberts, engineer and ironfounder, and Mary Jane Helme, his wife. His father was managing director of J and S Roberts, ironfounders of Swan Village. He was educated at King Edward VI School, Birmingham, and at St Bartholomew's Hospital. He took the Conjoint qualification in 1906, won honours in surgery at the London MB BS examination 1908, and took the Fellowship in 1909. He was house surgeon at St Luke's Hospital and at the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street, and to C B Lockwood at St Bartholomew's. He was then appointed demonstrator of surgical pathology and at the same time chief assistant surgeon to out-patients, and later demonstrator of operative surgery, at St Bartholomew's. He became in due course surgical registrar and chief assistant in the orthopaedic department. He was appointed in 1913 assistant surgeon to the East London Hospital for Children. Roberts served as a major, RAMC, in the war of 1914-18, at No 41 casualty clearing station in France and as surgical specialist at No 5 General Hospital; he was mentioned three times in despatches. His experience attracted him from orthopaedic to thoracic surgery. On his return to civil work he joined the staff of Brompton Hospital in 1919 and devoted most of his energy to this work, developing particularly the treatment of empyema. He was the first to use active negative pressure suction, and his operation for the closure of old chronic empyema cavities was the most efficient method devised up to the time of his death. With H P Nelson he introduced one-stage lobectomy. He was also in 1919 appointed assistant surgeon at St Bartholomew's, and became surgeon in 1933. On his retirement in 1946 he was elected consulting surgeon, and emeritus surgeon at Brompton. He was also surgeon to Queen Mary's Hospital at Roehampton, and consultant thoracic surgeon to the London County Council's Sanatoria. Roberts was president in turn of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, the Tuberculosis Association, and the Medical Society of London, where he gave the Lettsomian lectures in 1935 on the surgery of pleural and pulmonary infection. He was a member of the International Society of Surgery and joint honorary treasurer of its twelfth Congress held at the College in September 1947; a member of the Belgian and Polish Surgical Societies, and of the American Association of Thoracic Surgeons. He also served on the Ministry of Health's standing advisory committee on tuberculosis from its creation till his death, and for ten years on the Joint Tuberculosis Council. Roberts was an excellent teacher who created a school of thoracic surgeons to carry on his work. He spent his holidays in the Alps, and became an authority on alpine plants and on dragon-flies. He married on 30 December 1916 Coral, daughter of Captain J A Elmslie and sister of R C Elmslie, orthopaedic surgeon to St Bartholomew's. She survived him but without children. He died at The Croft, Ottershaw, Surrey, on 25 August 1948, aged 67, after a long illness. He had practised at 89 Harley Street. A memorial service was held at St Bartholomew-the-Less on 21 September 1948. Roberts based his surgical innovations on a sound knowledge of mechanical and physiological principles, combined with clinical and observational acumen. He was of a brusque fighting spirit, often absentminded and absorbed in his own work, but essentially kindly, loyal, and encouraging to younger men. He was one of the great pioneers of chest surgery, full of ideas and courage, with a deep concern for the general welfare of his patients especially children, and a wide knowledge of the practical aspects of many branches of medicine. Publications: Pulmonary lobectomy, with H P Nelson. *Brit J Surg* 1933, 21, 277. The surgery of pleural and pulmonary infection, Lettsomian lectures. *Trans Med Soc Lond* 1935, 58, 183. Extrapleural pneumothorax. *Brit J Tuberc* 1938, 32, 68. Primary carcinoma of the lung. *Med Press*, 1940, 203, 88. Thoracic surgery, in Grey Turner's *Modern operative surgery*, 3rd edition, 1943, 1, 305.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004522
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Windsor, Henry Matthew John (1914 - 1987)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2015-08-14
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E007000-E007999/E007700-E007799
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/379940379940
Occupation Cardiac surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Henry Matthew John Windsor, known as ‘Harry’, the eldest of five children of Dr Henry Joseph Windsor, a medical practitioner, and of Norah Agnes Matthew Windsor née Carroll, was born on 27 October 1914 in Cork, Ireland. His father had left for Australia before his birth and arrived there on 6 August 1914, two days after the outbreak of the first world war. In 1916 Harry and his mother joined Dr Windsor at Toowoomba, Queensland, where he had established a busy general practice before moving to Brisbane. Harry was educated at the Christian Brothers' College and at Nudgee College, Brisbane, before completing first year science at the University of Queensland. He then entered second year medicine at Sydney University in 1934 and graduated with honours in 1938. During student days he played first XV rugby for both Queensland and Sydney Universities. Following resident appointments at St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney, he served in a field ambulance, a casualty clearing station and hospitals with the Australian Imperial Forces from 1941 to 1946, latterly as a surgical specialist with the rank of Major. He had the distinction of securing the Sydney mastership of surgery during this period. His brother, Gerard Patrick Windsor, was killed in May 1942 while serving as a pilot in the Royal Australian Air Force. On demobilisation in 1946 he secured the Gordon Craig Training Fellowship at St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney. In the following year he took the FRACS and then moved to England to secure the FRCS before deciding to take up thoracic surgery. He trained at Harefield Hospital, Middlesex, and at the thoracic surgical unit in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Returning to Sydney in 1949 as surgeon to St Vincent's Hospital he began to establish thoracic surgery there and soon embarked on cardiac surgery. He started closed mitral valvotomy in 1951; open heart surgery with hypothermia in 1954 and soon, in 1960, did his first heart operation on cardiopulmonary by-pass. A first valve replacement was done in 1963 and the first Australian heart transplant on 23 October 1968, followed by coronary artery bypass surgery in the following year so that some 7000 of these operations were performed on his unit by 1986. Although officially retired from St Vincent's in 1979, and from Concord Hospital in 1984, he continued in active surgery as an assistant to two of his younger colleagues until 1985. It should be remembered that there was no systematic training in cardiac surgery during his early days. A hallmark of those and later years was the respect and cooperation which he inspired from his physician colleagues. But progress was slow due to limited facilities until he managed to persuade Sir Russell Brock to visit St Vincent's in 1957. Thereafter development continued apace. Harry Windsor was a keen overseas traveller to the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States. He also made seven visits to China, six of these being working trips when he lectured and operated in many parts of that country. He had a good working knowledge of Mandarin Chinese and keenly promoted the training of Chinese as well as Indian surgeons in Sydney. He did much to promote interchange between Australian and Chinese surgeons and had also been a visiting lecturer in Japan. His energy and enterprise were marked by the award of the honorary FACS in 1963 and of the honorary MD, New South Wales, in 1984. His early publications were of a general and pulmonary flavour but he later wrote innumerable papers on all aspects of cardiac surgery, and especially on valve replacement and coronary artery surgery. In 1975 he established the Harry Windsor Prize which makes a modest contribution towards the sending of a young Australian surgeon to the UK, or of a Briton to Australia, in alternate years. Harry was a tireless and dedicated worker with a great memory for people, places and events. He had a keen wit and a quite mischievous sense of humour. In his youth, as a vigorous rugby player, he had once represented New South Wales. The last five years of his life were marked by several major operations during which time he displayed great qualities of courage and tenacity. He had married Imelda Mary ‘Mollie’ Burfitt in 1942 and they had one daughter, Penelope, and five sons, Gerard, John, Michael, Guy (a doctor) and Hugh. When he died in St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney on 20 March 1987 he was survived by his wife and their six children.
Resource Identifier RCS: E007757
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
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First Title value, for Searching Edwards, Arthur Tudor (1890 - 1946)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2013-05-21
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004000-E004099
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/376198376198
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born 7 March 1890, the elder son of William Edwards of Langlands, Glamorgan, Chairman of Edwards Limited, and his wife Mary Griffith Thomas. He was educated at Mill Hill School and St John's College, Cambridge. He took his clinical training at the Middlesex Hospital, when Sir John Bland-Sutton was senior surgeon, and served as dresser and house surgeon to Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor; he was awarded a University scholarship in the Middlesex Hospital Medical School. After serving as surgical registrar at the hospital he was commissioned in the RAMC on the outbreak of the war in 1914. He worked in France, at No 6 casualty clearing station at Barlin under Sir Cuthbert Wallace, and at Wimereux under Meurice Sinclair; he attained the rank of major. On returning to London practice he became assistant surgeon to Westminster Hospital, and to the Brompton Hospital. At Brompton he played a pioneer part in applying to civilian illnesses the surgical intervention into the thorax which Pierre Delbet, G E Gask and others had successfully demonstrated in the treatment of war injuries. He explored successively the surgery of pulmonary tuberculosis, bronchiectasis, tumours of the mediastinum, tumours of the lung both malignant and simple. In all this work he was ably supported by his physician-colleague: R A Young and his anaesthetist Ivan Magill. In ten years he established thoracic surgery as a necessary specialty and himself as its recognized leader. In 1936 he gave up his general surgical work at the Westminster Hospital on appointment as first Director of the Department of Thoracic Surgery at the London Hospital. He was a consulting surgeon to King Edward VII's Sanatorium at Midhurst and to Queen Alexandra's Hospital, Millbank. As surgeon under the Ministry of Pensions to Queen Mary's Hospital at Roehampton he did valuable work in the repair of the aftermath of war-time gastric operations. He also supervised the London County Council's Thoracic Clinic at St Mary Abbott's Hospital, Kensington. During the war of 1939-45 Tudor Edwards, who had already undergone two severe illnesses in 1938 and 1939, was a civilian consultant with the Royal Air Force, adviser for thoracic casualties to the Ministry of Health, and civilian adviser to the War Office. He organized the reception centres for thoracic casualties under the Emergency Medical Service. He was an excellent teacher and did much to establish a school of thoracic surgeons in Great Britain. During the years of war he provided intensive courses of instruction for service thoracic units, and was assiduous in visiting these units all over the country. He was elected to the Council of the College in 1943, but died before he had completed three years as a councillor. Tudor Edwards was an operator of supreme skill and beautiful technique. He achieved an international reputation while still in his early forties. He was an Honorary Fellow of the American Society of Thoracic Surgeons, and president of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons at home. In the last years of his life he was elected first president of the new Association for the Study of Diseases of the Chest, and contributed a survey of one thousand operations for bronchial carcinoma to the first number of its journal *Thorax*. Edwards married on 13 April 1920 Evelyn Imelda Chichester Hoskin, daughter of Theophilus Hoskin, MRCS, of London and Cornwall. He practised at 139 Harley Street, but died suddenly while taking his holiday at St Enodoc, Cornwall, on 25 August 1946, aged 56. He was buried at St Enodoc Church. At a memorial service in London Lord Horder delivered an obituary oration. Mrs Tudor Edwards survived him, but without children; she died on 13 May 1951, and left £5,000 to the College for the promotion of surgical science. Tudor Edwards was of medium height, handsome and youthful in appearance with thick dark hair. Publications:- The following bibliography was prepared by Dr W R Bett for the National Association for the Prevention of Tuberculosis, and is printed by their generous permission. A case of carcinoma of transverse colon and intussusception. *Lancet*, 1919, 2, 1028. *Surgery*, with Ivor Back. London, Churchill (Students' synopsis series), 1920; 2nd edition, 1921. Thoracoscopy in surgery of chest. *Brit J Surg*. 1924, 12, 49. Intrathoracic new growths; account of seven operable cases. *Brit J Surg*. 1927, 14, 607. Present position of surgery in treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. *Brit J Tuberc*. 1927, 21, 145. Surgery of new growths of chest. *Tubercle*, 1927, 8, 267. Surgical treatment of phthisis and bronchiectasis. *Brit med J*. 1927, 1, 9. Discussion on treatment of chronic non-tuberculous infection of lungs, with G E Martin and L S T Burrell. *Proc Roy Soc Med*. 1927, 20, 35. After-effects of surgical procedures in cases of pulmonary tuberculosis; surgeon's point of view. *Brit med J*. 1928, 2, 602. The diagnosis and treatment of empyema. *Clin J*. 1928, 57, 613. Surgical technique of pulmonary abscess. *Brit J Surg*. 1929, 17, 102. Present state of surgical treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. *J State Med*. 1930, 38, 603. Discussion of intrathoracic tumours. *Proc Roy Soc Med*. 1930, 23, 25. Malignant disease of lung. *Brit med J*. 1931, 1, 129. Empyema thoracis; method of maintaining negative pressure drainage. *Lancet*, 1931, 2, 1126. Tuberculosis, pulmonary; surgical treatment. *Med Annu*. 1931, p 481, and revised contribution in subsequent annual issues. Surgical treatment of intrathoracic new growths. *Brit med J*. 1932, 1, 827. Bronchiectasis; surgical treatment. *Med Annu*. 1933, p 85, and revised contribution in subsequent annual issues. One-stage lobectomy for bronchiectasis; account of forty-eight cases, with C P Thomas. *Brit J Surg*. 1934, 22, 310. Malignant disease of lung. *J thorac Surg*. 1934, 4, 107. Bronchiectasis. *Postgrad med J*. 1935, 11, 44. Place of surgery in chest disease. *Practitioner*, 1935, 134, 14. Two cases of total pneumonectomy for bronchiectasis. *Proc Roy Soc Med*. 1936, 29, 221. Extirpation of oesophagus for carcinoma, with E S Lee. *J Laryng*. 1936, 51, 281. Diagnosis of malignant disease of the lung and mediastinum, in M Donaldson and others, *The early diagnosis of malignant disease*. Oxford, 1936. Heart and pericardium, surgery. *Med Annu*. 1937, p 198, and revised contribution in subsequent annual issues. Device for nasal administration of oxygen. *Lancet*, 1938, 2, 680. Treatment of injuries of chest. *Brit med J*. 1938, 2, 1096. Tumours of lung. *Brit J Surg*. 1938, 26, 166. Vascular endothelioma of lung, with A B Taylor. *Brit J Surg*. 1938, 25, 487. Cancer of lungs and pleurae. *Practitioner*, 1939, 143, 29. Modem principles of treatment in bronchiectasis based upon 199 cases treated by Iobectomy or total pneumonectomy. (Harveian lecture.) *Brit med J*. 1939, 1, 809. Traumatic haemothorax. *Lancet*, 1943, 1, 97. War wounds and injuries of chest. *Brit J Surg*. 1943, 31, 74. Early treatment of wounds and injuries to the chest, in British Medical Students Association *War surgery, lectures by various authors*, 1944. Penicillin in chest surgery. *Med Annu*. 1946, p 254.
Resource Identifier RCS: E004015
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching O'Shaughnessy, Laurence Frederick (1900 - 1940)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2013-09-11 2023-01-13
Unknown
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E004000-E004999/E004400-E004499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/376589376589
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Born at Sunderland, Co Durham on 24 December 1900, the son of Laurence O'Shaughnessy, inspector of customs and excise, and Mary Westgate, his wife, who died on 21 March 1941. He was educated at South Shields High School for Boys and left at the age of sixteen to go to Durham College of Medicine, his schooling being interrupted from August 1916 to January 1917 on the advice of his doctors. He held the Gibb, Phillipson, Scott, and Morison scholarships, graduating in the University of Durham with second class honours in 1923. At the Royal Victoria Hospital he filled the post of assistant pathologist before he had obtained a licence to practise and was afterwards house surgeon and house physician. He then came to London on his appointment as house surgeon at the Royal Northern Hospital, Holloway. In 1924 he entered the Sudan Medical Service as Inspector, was put in charge of the Omdurman Hospital, and worked experimentally at the Kitchener School of Medicine upon the surgery of the chest. He learnt German and, during his intervals of leave, went to Berlin to work under Ferdinand Sauerbruch. Leaving the Sudan in 1931, he again visited Berlin and spent six months with Professor Sauerbruch, whom he always spoke of afterwards as his spiritual father. Returning to England he was the first research scholar to be appointed at the Buckston Browne Farm, Downe, Kent. The results of his work there were given as Hunterian lectures at the Royal College of Surgeons on 20 February 1933 on "Thoracic surgery, the factor of post-operative infection" (unpublished), and on 23 February 1935 "On the surgery of the lung root" which appeared in *The Lancet*, 1935, 1, 476. In 1937 he delivered the Carey-Coombs memorial lecture at Bristol on "The pathology and surgical treatment of cardiac ischaemia". In the same year he received a certificate of honourable mention and an honorarium for the essay he had submitted for the Jacksonian prize given by the Royal College of Surgeons. The essay was not published. The subject proposed was "The surgery of the heart"; the prize was awarded to E J S King. In May 1937 he was awarded the John Hunter medal in bronze and the RCS triennial prize of £50 for 1934-36, for his research work on the surgery of the thorax. O'Shaughnessy joined the RAMC branch of the Territorial force soon after his return from the Sudan. He was called up for service in September 1939, and as a captain was attached first to the 13th General Hospital and afterwards to a casualty clearing station, where he hoped to use his knowledge of the treatment of thoracic injuries and surgical shock to the best advantage. He was blown to pieces in May 1940, whilst watching an air raid in Flanders. He married Gwendolen Mary Hunton, MB, BS Durham, on 3 October 1926; she survived him with a son. They had lived at 24 Croom's Hill, Greenwich. The early death of Laurence O'Shaughnessy was a serious loss to the special branch of surgery to which he was devoting his life and had done so much to advance. An untiring worker and a man of ideas, he had been able to combine the scientific with the clinical aspect of the surgery of the heart and the upper respiratory tract, whilst his paper on the "Aetiology of surgical shock" is already looked upon as a classic. At his instigation the London County Council established the Lambeth cardio-vascular clinic and appointed him the surgeon, Harry Edward Mansell, FRCP 1937, being his physician colleague; Dr Mansell died 1 June 1941. At the time of his death O'Shaughnessy was thoracic surgeon to the British Legion Sanatorium, Preston Hall, near Maidstone, Kent, to the Nottinghamshire County Council, to the Grosvenor Sanatorium, and to the Birmingham municipal tuberculosis scheme. Some of his early experiments were carried out on racing greyhounds with strained hearts. He grafted portions of omentum and found that their pace improved afterwards. These results he was beginning to apply successfully to the human heart. O'Shaughnessy was dark, of medium build and brisk movement, with a self-confident manner and somewhat harsh voice. Friendly and affable by nature, though intolerant of convention and inefficiency, he was always ready to expound his latest ideas and projects. Publications: *Thoracic surgery*, with Ferdinand Sauerbruch of Berlin. London, 1937. This book is much more than an abridged translation of Sauerbruch's monumental treatise. It helped to popularize an important and too little known branch of surgery. *Pulmonary tuberculosis*, with G G Kayne and Walter Pagel. Oxford, 1939. Double intestinal obstruction. *Lancet*, 1926, 2, 1163. Aetiology of peptic ulcer. *Ibid* 1931, 1, 177-181. Cutaneous horn on amputation stump, with F E Mayne. *Brit med J* 1931, 1, 624. Tumour of carotid body. *Brit J Surg* 1931, 19, 153. Phrenicectomy in treatment of pulmonary disease, with analysis of 58 cases. *Lancet*, 1932, 2, 767-770. Neurectomy and the sympathetic nervous system. *Newcastle med J* 1933, 13, 23-34. Social importance of collapse therapy. *Tubercle*, 1933, 14, 289-295. Discussion on some aspects of anaesthesia in animals. *Proc Roy Soc Med* 1933, 26, 533-38. Surgical exposure of the oesophagus, with R W Raven. *Brit J Surg* 1934, 22, 589-618. Surgery of the lung root, Hunterian lecture, RCS. *Lancet*, 1935, 1, 476-480. Aetiology of traumatic shock, with D Slome. *Brit J Surg* 1934-35, 22, 589-618. Experimental method of providing collateral circulation to the heart. *Brit J Surg* 1936, 23, 665-670. Vagus and its relation to surgery of the lung. *J thoracic Surg* 1936, 5, 386-392. Temporary paralysis of diaphragm in treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis, with J H Crawford. *Lancet*, 1936, 1, 534. Cardiospasm: aetiology and treatment. *Postgrad med J* 1936, 12, 468. Surgical treatment of cardiac ischaemia. *Lancet*, 1937, 1, 185-194. Surgery of oesophagus and diaphragm. Maingot's *Post-graduate surgery*, 1937, 3, 5037-5118. Pathology and surgical treatment of cardiac ischaemia, Carey Coombs memorial lecture, Bristol med-chic Soc, 5 May 1937. *Bristol med chir J* 1937, 54, 109-126. Surgery of the heart. *Practitioner*, 1938, 140, 603-618. Surgical treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis, with J H Crawford. *Postgrad med J* 1938, 14, 38-48. Thoracolysis: conservative and selective operation for treatment of certain cases of pulmonary tuberculosis, with G Mason. *Brit med J* 1939, 1, 97-100. Surgical revascularisation of the heart: experimental basis, with D Slome and F Watson. *Lancet*, 1939, 1, 617-621. La greffe de revascularisation du coeur: cardio-omentopexie. *Bull et Mém Soc Méd Paris*, 1939, 143, 49-59. Surgery of the heart. *Newcastle med J* 1939, 19, 61-73. The future of cardiac surgery. *Lancet*, 1939, 2, 969-971. Haemoglobin solution as blood substitute, with H E Mansell and D Slome. *Lancet*, 1939, 2, 1068. **This is an amended version of the original obituary which was printed in volume 2 of Plarr’s Lives of the Fellows. Please contact the library if you would like more information lives@rcseng.ac.uk**
Resource Identifier RCS: E004406
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Belsey, Ronald Herbert Robert (1910 - 2007)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2008-02-07 2009-01-16
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000400-E000499
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372631372631
Occupation Thoracic surgeon
Details Ronnie Belsey was a consultant thoracic surgeon, known worldwide for his innovative techniques in oesophageal surgery. He was born on 2 April 1910 in London, the son of Herbert Robert Belsey, a dental surgeon, and Marie Martha Annie née Moller. He was educated at Woodbridge School, Suffolk. There he excelled, not only in his studies but also in a variety of sports, and was made head prefect in 1926. From Woodbridge he won an entrance scholarship to St Thomas’ Hospital where, in addition to medical studies, he played rugby and ice hockey. Among his memories of this period he recounted the two London hospitals cup finals against St Mary’s, both of which Tommy’s won. After qualifying with the conjoint diploma in 1934, he went on to sit the London MB BS examination, winning the coveted Beaney prize for surgery (with honours). During his training he was house surgeon on the surgical unit to Max Page, Hugo Romanis and Norman (Pasty) Barrett. In later years he could concede that Barrett had a major influence in moulding his interests in oesophageal surgery. In 1936 he moved to the Brompton Hospital as a resident surgical officer, working with the doyens of thoracic surgery - Tudor Edwards, J E H Roberts and Clement Price Thomas, not to mention the up and coming Russell Claude Brock. With Roberts he was closely involved in developing extrapleural pneumonolysis and artificial pneumothorax in the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. At the same time Brock was breaking new ground in our College in defining the anatomy of the bronchial tree. These influences by the giants of thoracic surgery kindled in Belsey a lasting interest in that field. In 1937 he was awarded the Dorothy Temple Cross scholarship, which enabled him to go to the USA as a research fellow at the Harvard Medical School, acting as clinical assistant to Edward (Pete) Churchill. The outcome of this collaboration was the outstanding contribution which they jointly made to pulmonary surgery: ‘Segmental pneumonectomy in bronchiectasis’ (*Annals of Surgery*, Vol.109, 1939, No.4, pp.481-499). He rounded this year off with a paper presented in Atlanta to the American Association of Thoracic Surgeons on extrapleural pneumothorax. On returning to England, he was appointed as a resident assistant surgeon at St Thomas’ Hospital, in time to witness the outbreak of the Second World War. With the evacuation of the medical school to locations outside London, Belsey was left with a skeleton surgical staff to cope with war casualties, an experience he cherished. In 1941 he was sent down to the West Country to establish a thoracic surgical service for the south west region. Having initially worked at a tuberculosis sanatorium in Kew Stoke, outside Weston-super-Mare, in 1944 he moved to Frenchay Hospital, which until then had been a Nissen-hutted evacuation hospital run by the US Army Medical Corps for war casualties. Here he established the south west regional thoracic centre, training surgeons to man units in Tehidi (for Cornwall and south Devon) and Bovey Tracey (for north Devon). From the outset he worked on the principle (to put it in his own words): “you cannot make friends and at the same time get things done”. True to his word, he went ahead and made several enemies. The result was an excellent thoracic surgical centre manned by two consultants, well known all over the world, training surgeons who went on to lead some of the best centres in Europe and North America. He received a constant stream of trainees from the USA and Canada, initially from the Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, and later from the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore. In reciprocation he made a visit each year to the USA to attend the annual meeting of the American Association of Thoracic Surgeons. It was on one such visit in 1966 that he delivered the honoured guest lecture to that association on the surgical treatment of functional diseases of the oesophagus, which to this day remains the authoritative paper on the subject. He will however be remembered for the Mark IV operation for control of gastro-oesophageal reflux. His interest in hiatal herniation was initiated during the year he spent in Boston, when Harrington presented his paper on the anatomical repair of hiatus hernia. Whilst working in Frenchay, Belsey made several attempts at a physiological repair constructing an anti-reflux valve mechanism. Having designated these attempts as Marks I to III, he came to the conclusion that a 270 degree partial inversion wrap produced the best result. This he called the Mark IV repair, the description and results of which were only communicated to the surgical world, not by himself but by his senior registrar, after a ten year follow-up of his patients. In the early fifties, with declining tuberculosis and bronchiectasis, and an increasing potential for cardiac surgery, the regional thoracic centre became the regional cardio-thoracic centre. Closed heart surgery flourished and with the advent of open heart surgery ‘the B’ (as Belsey came to be known) was invited to move the open-heart unit to the Bristol Royal Infirmary. Like the true researcher that he was, he set off to study cardiopulmonary bypass on animals at the Bristol University Veterinary School in Langford. He then took himself off to join his friend Charles Drew at the Westminster Hospital to learn the technique of profound hypothermia using quadruple cannulation. He returned to set up the cardiac unit at the Infirmary, devoting his time to the Children’s Hospital, Bristol Royal Infirmary and Frenchay. Despite his commitment to paediatric cardiac surgery, his main interest was in congenital tracheo-oesophageal fistula, atresia and other non-cardiac conditions in the newborn. He was a pioneer in the use of the left hemicolon in oesophageal replacement surgery and a firm believer in the place of stainless steel wire sutures in thoracic surgery, a conclusion arrived at in the tuberculosis era. Belsey was a meticulous technical surgeon, handling tissues with the utmost gentleness, and working with dexterity and complete economy of hand movement. “Doctor, remember you are dealing with human flesh, handle it with care, not macerate it,” he would tell his assistant if the latter was caught manhandling the organs. Even when confronted with a complex situation in the operating room ‘the B’ was in total command, and his assistants knew that he was. In 1973 he was awarded the Colles medal by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, and a year later the Sir Clement Price Thomas medal of our College. In 1983 he delivered the Tudor Edwards memorial lecture under the auspices of our College. He also collected medals from the universities of Leiden and Padua for services to thoracic surgery. Belsey retired from the National Health Service in 1975 and in the following year was invited to join the department of surgery at the University of Chicago, where he spent six months of each year participating in teaching postgraduates until 1988. He published extensively and co-edited a book on *Gastroesophageal reflux and hiatal hernia* (Little Brown, 1972) and in 1988 (with David Skinner) the monumental textbook *Management of esophageal disease* (Philadelphia, Saunders). He travelled worldwide, and held visiting professorships in several universities in Europe and America. He took great delight in spending short sojurns in Cairo, operating on children with corrosive strictures of the gullet. He was awarded honorary memberships and fellowships of several surgical societies both in Europe and America. He was an early member of Brown’s Club and a founder-member of the Esophageal Club in the United States. He was a past president of the Society of Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1996 during the presidency of the European Association for Cardio-Thoracic Surgery of his last registrar in Bristol, he was made an honorary member, the citation being presented by his last senior registrar and successor at Frenchay. Early in his surgical career, Belsey started planning for his retirement. He was an excellent shot, an aptitude he attributed to the genes he acquired from his father who had won several prizes at Bisley. He was a member of the Bristol Gun Club and was a collector both of long and short firearms. He was a keen fly fisherman and belonged to the Frenchay Fly Fishing Club, which met regularly on the Usk in Monmouthshire. When time permitted he would disappear into the depths of the Devon countryside with a local group of fly fishermen, delicately designing his own flies, and fishing on the Dart. In 1969 he acquired Combestone, an old farmhouse with a stretch of the river below Dartmeet. This was the family weekend retreat. Belsey married Pauline May Tilbury in October 1941, a graduate of the Florence Nightingale School of Nursing at St Thomas’. Pauline, who loved the farm and nursed many a delicate and feeble lamb into healthy adulthood, died in 2000. They had three daughters, one of whom, Gay, died in infancy. Annabelle trained as a nurse at St Thomas’, where she became a theatre sister and is married to an anaesthetist, Stuart Ingram: they have two sons. Gillian followed her father into medicine, became a senior partner in a general practice in north Devon and predeceased Ronald in 2002. With increasing inability to walk down to his beloved Dart, Belsey took to carving handles for walking sticks out of wood and bone, which he would give away to friends and visitors. Despite his reluctance to move out of his farmhouse, and the dedicated support of his nursing carer, Dorothy Steele, it became clear that a remote dwelling on Dartmoor was not the best place for a 94 year old. In March 2004 he agreed to move to a nursing home in Denbury, near Newton Abbot, where he remained with excellent mental facilities, able to converse intelligently until his last days. Ronald Belsey died on 22 May 2007. His funeral service at the church of St Mary the Virgin, Holne, was attended by members of his family, fishing and local friends, and several of his medical and surgical colleagues and former trainees, who later retired next door to the Church House Inn, a popular old haunt of his.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000447
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset

First Title value, for Searching Godlee, Sir Rickman John (1849 - 1925)

2024-05-09T00:13:17Z

by Royal College of Surgeons of England
Publication Date 2006-05-11 2012-03-22
JPEG Image
Asset Path Root/Lives of the Fellows/E000000-E000999/E000200-E000299
URL for Files https://livesonline.rcseng.ac.uk/client/en_GB/search/asset/372408372408
Occupation General surgeon Thoracic surgeon
Details Born of Quaker parents in Queen Square, London, W.C., on February 15th, 1849, the second son of Rickman Godlee, a barrister of the Inner Temple who had married Mary Lister, the only sister of Joseph, Lord Lister. Marcus Beck (q.v.), therefore, was a cousin, and Lord Lister his uncle. Godlee was brought up in the prosperous and quiet environment of which he afterwards gave so charming an account in the *Life* of his uncle. He was sent to Mr. Abbott's school at Grove House, Tottenham, where most of the Friends' children were educated, and here he learnt to become a field botanist and ornithologist, for natural history was prominent in the curriculum. He graduated in Arts at the University of London before he embarked on medicine, and entered University College in 1867, where he soon attracted attention as a neat dissector. He graduated M.B. and M.S. at the University of London, winning a Gold Medal at each examination. He served the office of House Surgeon to Sir John Eric Erichsen (q.v.), and at the end of the year 1872 he went to live with his uncle, who was then Professor of Clinical Surgery in the University of Edinburgh. He studied his methods, and published the results of his observations in the *Lancet* (1878, i, 694, 729) with the title, "The Antiseptic Treatment in Edinbugh". Godlee then returned to London and was appointed Surgical Registrar at University College Hospital. Whilst acting in this capacity, on May 20th, 1874, he opened an abscess connected with acute necrosis of the tibia. He made careful drawings of the microscopic appearances of the pus with the aid of a camera lucida, and observed "certain curious minute bodied which were arranged in rows or chains". They were streptococci, but he failed to name them. It was not until the International Congress of 1881 that Koch showed photographs of the micro-organisms he had found at the margins of erysipelatous lesions. Godlee afterwards wrote on the drawing, "This was, so far as I know, the first time that organisms were seen in the pus of an abscess immediately it was opened". The drawing is now in the Lister wall case in Room I of the College Museum. He was elected Assistant Surgeon to Charing Cross Hospital and Lecturer on Anatomy in the Medical School in 1876, and resigned both offices in 1878. He was also Surgeon to the North-Eastern (now the Queen's) Hospital for Children in the Hackney Road from 1876. He was elected Assistant Surgeon to University College Hospital in 1877. The post was a new one and carried with it an Assistant Demonstratorship of Anatomy in University College. As a demonstrator of anatomy Godlee was able to make use of his great artistic powers. He began the drawings for *An Atlas of Human Anatomy* in 1876, with the design of illustrating most of the ordinary dissections and many not usually practised by the student. The *Atlas* was accompanied by an explanatory text. Over one hundred dissections were made for its preparation, mostly by himself during the years 1876-1880, the years during which he waited for patients. He drew each dissection in pencil, giving the vessels and nerves their distinctive colours, and the drawings were then reproduced on stone. The lithographer was able to retain the clarity of the originals but lost much of their softness. Parts I-V of the *Atlas* were published in 1877-1878, and the whole appeared with 48 plates in 1880. Godlee also made the drawings for Quain's *Anatomy* and Erichsen's *Science and the Art of Surgery*. He drew them on wood himself and they were then beautifully engraved by the elder Butterworth. There appears to be very little doubt that Godlee inherited his artistic powers and tastes through his mother from the Lister side of the family. The collection at the Royal College of Surgeons contains drawings made by Sir Joseph Lister in 1862-1864 when he was planning his operation for the excision of the wrist. Some are in black-and-white, some in water-colour, and some in oils. They all show that Lister could have made his name as an artist and draughtsman. Godlee's style resembles that of his uncle, but his work is rather more accurate and delicate. He was appointed Surgeon to the Brompton Hospital for Consumption and Diseases of the Chest on Nov. 6th, 1884, and retained the office until June 6th, 1900, when he was nominated Consulting Surgeon. The post was a new one; his predecessors, Robert Liston, Sir William Fergusson, John Marshall, and Sir Joseph Lister, had only been called in occasionally. Godlee soon justified the appointment. He began to lecture, and published in the *Lancet* for 1885 and 1887, "The Surgical Treatment Empyema and of Pulmonary Cavities", and in 1890 there appeared, "On the Surgical Aspect of Hepatic Abscess, being three Lectures delivered at the Hospital for Consumption and Diseases of the Chest, Brompton", with 7 illustrations. In 1898 he joined Sir James Kingston Fowler in writing the surgical portion of *The Diseases of the Lungs*, in which they were assisted by Drs. Percy Kidd and A.E. Voelcker. Godlee acted as private assistant to Lord Lister for some years whilst he was waiting for promotion at University College, and on November 25th, 1884, he came prominently before the public as a pioneer in cerebral surgery. The patient, a man of 25, was diagnosed by Dr. Hughes Bennett as having a tumour of the brain. He was admitted into the Hospital for Epilepsy and Paralysis, Regent's Park, and the position of the tumour was located by the recent experimental work of Ferrier as being situated in the cortical substance near the upper third of the fissure of Rolando. The patient expressed a strong desire to have it removed, and Rickman Godlee was called upon to operate. The localization proved to be accurate and the glioma was extirpated without difficulty, but the patient died of secondary surgical complications. An outcry at once arose that the operation was unjustifiable, but *The Times* published two sensible leading articles and it was generally agreed that an advance had been made in regard to surgical interference with the human brain. The details of the case appear in the *Lancet* (1884, ii, 1090). Godlee became full Surgeon at University College Hospital in 1885 and resigned on April 1st, 1914. He succeeded his cousin, Marcus Beck, as Professor of Clinical Surgery in 1892, and was appointed Holme Professor of Clinical Surgery in 1900 in succession to Christopher Heath (q.v.). At the Royal College of Surgons Godlee held many honourable offices. He was an Examiner in Anatomy in 1884, a Member of the Court of Examiners from 1893-1903, Bradshaw Lecturer in 1907, and Hunterian Orator in 1913. He was elected a Member of the Council in 1897, and as Vice-President filled the place of President during the year 1911 when Sir Henry Butlin died in office. He was re-elected President in 1912 and again in 1913. One of his last acts as President was to deliver an address in the United States on the occasion of the Foundation of the American College of Surgeons, of which he was elected an honorary Fellow. He then reviewed the history of the English College in such a spirit of brotherhood that his address on the eve of the Great War formed a valuable link between the medical activities of the two countries. At the Royal Society of Medicine Godlee acted as one of the honorary librarians from 1907-1916, having filled the same post in the Royal Medico-Chirurgical Society from 1895, and was President in 1916-1917. During the War (1914-1918) he worked steadily to maintain medical efficiency, and was a constant attendant of the Central Medical War Committee, whose duty it was to recommend methods by which our armies abroad could be adequately supplied with medical officers without depleting the medical service at home. He was also Chairman of the Belgian Doctors' and Pharmacists' Relief Fund, and in this position was instrumental in bringing to the notice of the General Medical Council the advantage of allowing Belgian practitioners to qualify in England and thus to place them in a position to earn their living. Early in 1916 it became possible to relieve the medical men and pharmacists in Belgium itself, and for some months sums of money were sent to Brussels every week through the agency of the International Commission for Relief until the amount disbursed had risen to £25,000. Godlee carefully investigated the amounts paid out and made himself acquainted with the details of each grant and the destination of every cheque. In 1920 he retired to Combe End, a farm which he had long cultivated at Whitchurch in Oxfordshire. It overlooked the Thames and the grounds ran down to the river. Here he made many improvements and additions to the house, acted as a gentleman farmer, took part in the affairs of the village, and wrote a history of it in the Parish Magazine. He did not, however, lose interest in the College, and was enabled to carry out a project which had been long in his mind - the worthy display of Lord Lister's instruments and manuscripts. It was proposed at first to place the memorial in the Library, but when this was found inappropriate, a cabinet made from the design of the College architect - Mr. Freer - was placed in the Museum and was formally inaugurated on the occasion of the First Lister Memorial Lecture, May 14th, 1925. Godlee married in 1891 Juliet Mary, daughter of Frederic Seebohm, LL.D., D.Litt., of the Hermitage, Hitchin, but had no children. He died at Whitchurch on Sunday, April 18th, 1925, with the diagnosis of ruptured abdominal aneurysm, but there was no post-mortem examination. He was buried at Whitchurch. Lady Godlee survived him. Many honours fell to Rickman Godlee. He was surgeon to the Household in the time of Queen Victoria, and Surgeon in Ordinary to King Edward VII and to King George V. He was created a baronet in 1912 and was decorated K.C.V.O. in 1914. He was a Fellow of University College, London, an Hon. LL.D. of the University of Toronto, a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, and an Hon. M.D. of Trinity College, Dublin. A striking portrait in oils was presented to the College by Lady Godlee in 1925. Godlee retained to the last many traces of his Quaker ancestry. Absolutely honest, downright, and somewhat sarcastic, he took nothing for granted that was capable of demonstration. Whatever he undertook was done thoroughly, and he thus became an expert oarsman, for he loved the river; a good carpenter; an excellent farmer; and a field naturalist. His artistic tastes extended beyond drawing, for he made a fine collection of etchings and was an expert in books, their paper and their binding. Courteous in manner and easy of address, he filled the office of President of the College with great dignity. He was a good teacher, but not so good as Marcus Beck, and he left no school as did his cousin. He operated well and did much to improve the surgery of the chest, and more to ensure that his uncle's methods were carried out in their entirety. He left about £94,000, and, after making certain specific bequests, directed that the residue should be divided between University College Hospital and College, £10,000 being devoted to the foundation of Travelling Scholarships. PUBLICATIONS:- Godlee has a permanent place in the history of surgery both for his *Life of Lister* and for the part he took in collecting and publishing Lister's writings:- (i) *Lord Lister*, 8vo, portraits, illustrations, etc., London, 1917; 3rd ed., revised, 8vo, Oxford 1924. This biography is written, like all Godlee's works, in excellent idiomatic English. It is written, too, in the spirit dictated by Lister himself, who said that "a scientist's public life lies in the work that is his". That is to say, the main part of the biography is a history of antiseptic surgery written by one who was intimately associated with Lister in his experimental work and its developments, and who for many years, in association with Sir W. Watson Cheyne, assisted him in his operative practice. It includes, therefore, a graphic sketch of Victorian medicine in Edinburgh, Glasgow, and London, as well as on the Continent. It shows how the revolutionary doctrines were received and the spirit in which they were interpreted. (ii) *The Collected Papers of Joseph, Baron Lister*, 2 vols., 4to, Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1909. These volumes were prepared for the Press by a committee consisting of Sir Hector C. Cameron, Sir William Watson Cheyne, Bart., Rickman J. Godlee, C. J. Martin, M.D., and Dawson Williams, M.D. The volumes are illustrated throughout and must always remain the classical corpus of Lister's work. Amongst his other publications are: - *An Atlas of Human Anatomy illustrating most of the Ordinary Dissections and many not usually Practised by the Student*, 8vo, London, 1880. Parts I-V were published in 1877-8. "Cases of Intussusception treated by Operation." - *Lancet*, 1898, ii, 1262. "Case of Rare Fracture of the Radius," 8vo, London, 1884; reprinted from *Clin. Soc. Trans*., 1883, xvi, 120. "Nephrectomy for Tumour in an Infant," from *Clin. Soc. Trans.*, 1885, xviii, 31. "On a Case of Obstruction of One Ureter by a Calculus, accompanied by Complete Suppression of Urine," 8vo, London, 1887; reprinted from *Med.-Chir. Trans.*, 1887, lxx, 237. "Surgical Treatment of Empyema" and of "Pulmonary Cavities," Lectures, *Lancet*, 1886, i, 51; 1887, i, 457. "Reflections suggested by a Series of Cases of Renal Calculus." - *Practitioner*, 1887, xxxix, 241, 329. "Some Cases of Abdominal Cysts following Injury," from *Clin. Soc. Trans*., 1887, xx, 219. *Introductory Address in the Faculty of Medicine at University College, London, October,* 1889, 8vo, London, 1889. "On the Surgical Aspect of Hepatic Abscess. Being three Lectures delivered at the Hospital for Consumption and Diseases of the Chest, Brompton," 8vo, 7 illustrations, London, 1890; reprinted from *Brit. Med. Jour.,* 1890, i, 61, etc. *The Past, Present and Future of the School of Advanced Medical Studies of University College, London:* being the Introductory Address at the Opening of the Winter Session, October, 1906, 8vo, illustrated, London, 1907. *The Bradshaw Lecture on Prognosis in Relation to Treatment of Tuberculosis of the Genito-urinary Organs,* delivered before the Royal College of Surgeons of England, December, 1907, with portrait of Dr. William Wood Bradshaw, 8vo, London, 1908. *The Hunterian Oration* delivered at The Royal College of Surgeons, 1913, with portraits of John Hunter and of the several conservators, plates of the Museum, John Hunter's death-mask, etc., 8vo, London, 1913. *Birmingham and Midland Institute. Our Attitude towards Modern Miracles.* A Presidential Address, 1919, 8vo, portrait, 1919. "Thomas Wharton Jones," with portrait, and bibliography of Wharton Jones, 8vo, London, 1921; reprinted from *Brit. Jour. Ophthalmol*., 1921, v, 97, 145. *The Diseases of the Lungs* (with JAMES KINGSTON FOWLER), 8vo, London and New York, 1898. Godlee revised the 6th and 7th editions of Heath's *Practical Anatomy*, 8vo, 24 coloured plates, London, 1885 and 1888. Appendix, "Superficial and Surgical Anatomy" (with G.D. THANE), in Quain's *Anatomy*, 10th ed., 8vo, London, 1896. *Two Cases of Bronchiectiasis,* etc (with Charles Theodore Williams), 8vo, London, 1886. "Stretching of the Facial Nerve for the Relief of Spasm of the Facial Muscles" (with W. ALLEN STURGE), 8vo, London, 1881; reprinted from *Clin. Soc. Trans.*, 1881, xiv, 44. "The Doctors and Mr. Lloyd George. Reply of the Royal Colleges" (with Sir THOMAS BARLOW), a letter in *The Times*, 1912, Feb. 15. *Six Papers by Lord Lister, with a Short Biography and Explanatory Notes by Sir Rickman J. Godlee, Bt., K.C.V.O.* (Medical Classics Series), 8vo, portraits, coloured plates, etc., London, 1921. *See also* Holmes and Hulke's *Surgery*. A further list of pamphlets is contained in a volume of *Pamphlets and Reprints*, presented to the Library by Lady Godlee after Sir Rickman's death. Among the 37 titles are a number not mentioned in the foregoing bibliography.
Resource Identifier RCS: E000221
Collection Plarr's Lives of the Fellows
Format Obituary
Format Asset