Bryan Nicholas Brooke
First professor of surgery St George’s Hospital (b 1915; q Cambridge/St Bartholomew’s 1939; MD, FRCS), d 18 September 1998. After service in the Royal Army Medical Corps he decided to follow a career in academic surgery and joined Professor Alan Stammers in the new professorial surgical unit at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. It was here that Brooke made his outstanding contribution to the management of ulcerative colitis. The Birmingham group and a few like minded colleagues were able to show that an ileostomy using the adherent device, combined with staged colectomy and subsequently proctocolectomy, produced outstandingly successful results. Brooke also devised a simple eversion ileostomy, later adopted world wide. His awareness of the problems encountered by his patients led him to found the Ileostomy Association in 1956 and he was the first president. He was an exuberant extrovert in whom an acute and almost irrepressible sense of humour was combined with high intelligence and ability and he openly challenged authority and any precept that he considered questionable or second rate. The younger surgeons revelled in the ambience that pervaded his unit and most were encouraged to take part in a research project. Brooke was hurt and disappointed when he was not chosen to succeed Stammers but in 1963 he was appointed the first professor of surgery at St George’s Hospital. His senior colleagues, however, found the presence of an unconventional academic in their midst disquieting, while Brooke felt isolated and constrained. Despite the support of his juniors further national recognition was scanty and he never regained in London the standing he had held in Birmingham. But his international reputation flourished; he was in demand at international meetings and as a visiting professor. He was an external examiner and published several textbooks. He was a demanding editor and all his contributors became familiar with his insistence on substantial revisions before an article was deemed acceptable. Outside medicine Brooke was a skilled potter, an able painter, and a craftsman carpenter. He designed the altar rails for the local church where his funeral was held. He leaves a wife, Naomi; three daughters; and his companion, Diana, who nursed him throughout his final illness.
John Callander
General practitioner Bo’ness, West Lothian, 1956-93 (b Glasgow 1931; q Glasgow 1954; FRCGP), died from cancer after a very short illness on 7 October 1998. He transformed a singlehanded practice in a mining area in Bo’ness into a six doctor partnership, working with a primary healthcare team from a purpose built centre, with radiology, physiotherapy, and some hospital outreach facilities. As a trainer John conveyed his enthusiasm to his many trainees. In the early 1970s he entered medicopolitics, initially on his local medical committee and then nationally on the General Medical Services Committee. John chaired the Scottish GMSC, the Scottish council, and the conference of local medical committees. He chaired the Scottish Medical Practices Committee, and served on the area medical committee and the local hospital trust board. John will be remembered as being sociable, convivial, and cheerful. A gentle but firm persuasive person, he and his wife, Joy, enjoyed most of all their family, gardening, and hill walking. He also leaves a son, two daughters, and six grandchildren.
by Alistair Riddell
Lucy Margaret Elsom
Former general practitioner Derby (b 1897; q King’s College Hospital 1923), died from old age on 28 May 1998. She only became a medical student because her father thought that nursing was too menial a job after he had paid for a good education. Only London University would confer a medical degree without Latin and so she went to King’s where she was accepted without examination and joined 11 other women students. She was the first of three children from her family of nine to qualify at King’s. After a few years in hospital posts she set up in general practice. Patients came slowly and were mainly women and children, but being appointed parish doctor gave her a small additional income. She also worked as an anaesthetist at Derby Children’s Hospital and Derby Royal Infirmary. During the second world war her tasks included examining enemy aliens, including Irish nuns, on their way to be interned. After the introduction of the NHS she took on a partner and after retirement kept busy with locum posts. An active member of the Soroptimists and a regular worshipper at the United Reform Church, Lucy retained an interest in the medical world and only failing sight prevented her from reading the BMJ at the age of 98.
by Joyce Epsom
Ralph Harding Farrow
Former general practitioner Sutton Coldfield, 1966-93 (b Gullane 1935; q Edinburgh 1960), died from a ruptured aortic aneurysm on 16 June 1998. His ambition to be a GP started at the age of 13, and after house jobs he joined a practice in a mining village in the west riding of Yorkshire before moving to the Midlands. For many years he was medical officer to the local National Children’s Home. He practised with commonsense and good humour and became a firm friend to his patients. He was a keen fisherman, enjoyed a rough shoot rather than a driven one, and was happiest in his garden. He leaves a wife, Nesta (also a doctor); two sons and a daughter; and four grandchildren.
by Nesta Farrow
Monica Madeline Mary Meynell Fisher
Medical officer of health for maternity and child welfare Oxford, 1933-60 (b London 1905; q London 1930; DCH), d 20 August 1998. Taught to read and write by D H Lawrence before going to school at 10, she was intent on becoming a farmer. She obtained a degree in agriculture at the University of Reading, after which her father persuaded her to study medicine. She established the first local authority contraceptive clinic in 1935, publishing several papers describing its effectiveness. She moved to Oxford in 1960 with her husband, the late Professor David Fisher. She was a coordinator for a geriatric survey and was a part time demonstrator in the department of physiology. Predeceased by her husband and a son, she leaves three daughters; eight grandchildren; and six great grandchildren.
by Chloe Fisher
Lilian Frances Jones
Former consultant paediatrician Swindon and north Wiltshire (b 1925; q Birmingham 1949; FRCP), died a few months after surgery for abdominal cancer, on 10 October 1998. For some years she was the department of paediatrics but enlisted the help of consultants from Bristol and Oxford. Later she trained a few GPs who helped in the clinics. She was a major influence in the development of the Princess Margaret Hospital, which opened in 1964. There is now a flourishing department staffed by five consultants, although she never saw the purpose built department that was promised at her appointment. Lilian built up associations with Bristol, Oxford, and Southampton as successive changes of region were imposed. A great personality, she was a remarkable combination of gentleness and firmness, of caring and thoughtfulness. Outside medicine her interests were walking and tennis—she was still playing at Marlborough Tennis Club within a few weeks of her terminal illness.
by Philip Powley
Robert Noel Hall
Former head of medical services, northern Nigeria, and general practitioner Northampton (b Newcastle-under-Lyme 1901; q Cambridge/St George’s 1926), d 7 October 1998. He was a founder member of the Cambridge University Medical Association and gained a blue for running. He joined the colonial medical service as a travelling doctor in northern Nigeria, a remote area of semidesert and bushland. During 22 years’ service he established a major hospital in Kano and became head of medical services. After retirement he was a general practitioner in Northampton for 20 years. A keen golfer and knowledgeable racing man, he was medical officer at the Towcester Races for 25 years and attended Royal Ascot regularly. He was blind in later life due to macular degeneration. He leaves a wife, Doreen; three sons; nine grandchildren; and a great grandson.
by Harold Brown
Michael James Hunter
Former general practitioner Jersey, 1956-81 (b Putney 1925; q Cambridge/Guy’s 1951), d 11 September 1998. He did his national service in the Royal Army Medical Corps and saw active service in Korea and was later in charge of a surgical ward in Japan with United Nations forces. After he retired he devoted his energies to establishing Jersey Hospice Care. He was a council member and a member of the advisory and management committee until he retired in 1997. He was designated medical officer to the States of Jersey employment and social security committee. He leaves a wife, Lois; two sons and a daughter; and five grandchildren.
by H P L Falla
Susan Nicholls (née Parish)
Senior clinical medical officer and staff grade paediatrician (b 1950; q St Bartholomew’s 1974), died from cancer on 7 October 1998. Sue was a woman of many jobs: she worked in family planning and was a staff grade paediatrician. She was a senior clinical medical officer in occupational health and a medical adviser to two adoption panels. For the past two years she was a student at Warwick University and had recently passed her exams for an MSc in community child health. Sue was a staunch Christian and led a church youth club and Pathfinders’ group. She was a school governor for many years and chairman of the governors for four. She had great energy and enthusiasm. An operation revealed cancer of the gall bladder and tests showed metastases in the spine. She was able to spend her final days at home surrounded by her family. She leaves a husband, Colin; two sons; and two daughters.
by Colin Nicholls
Louis Jonah Opit
Emeritus professor of community medicine at the University of Kent at Canterbury 1984-92 (b Australia 1927; q Adelaide 1949; FRCS, FRACS), died from carcinoma of the pancreas on 17 May 1998. Lou qualified to enter medical school at the age of 15 but had to wait a year before starting. He worked as a registrar in surgery in England and then returned to Adelaide as a senior lecturer and then reader in surgery. A Harkness fellowship enabled him to undertake biochemical research at Harvard for a year. In 1959 he was appointed to a special research fellowship at King’s College Hospital Medical School. While there he studied pure mathematics and gained a first class honours BSc from the University of Warwick. He then moved to Birmingham for six years as senior research fellow in the department of social medicine. Lou returned to Australia until 1984 to become professor of social and preventative medicine at Monash University, and then came to Canterbury. After retirement his services were sought by many trusts and by the World Health Organisation. Lou published widely; he was particularly proud of his article in Nature on new conceptual models for ionic transport within cells. More recently he concentrated on strategic planning for acute services, assessing the need for institutional care for the elderly and the implications of Calman training schemes in surgery and surgical practice. He was proudly Jewish. During his last illness he used his great computer skills to inform his many friends through words and pictures about his illness. He leaves a partner, Jan; four children from his marriage, which was dissolved; and eight grandchildren.
by Richard Collins and Malcolm Forsythe
Ralph Schram
Former director of the Bureau of Hygiene and Tropical Diseases London (b 1927; q St Thomas’s 1954; DPH, FFPHM), died from leukaemia on 4 September 1998. He first did a biochemistry degree at Cambridge, but when he felt called to go to Africa he turned to medicine as there were no jobs for biochemists in tropical Africa. He went to Ibadan, Nigeria, where he was the only white houseman, and stayed for eight years. After some time in Scotland where he wrote his MD thesis on A History of the Nigerian Health Services, he returned to Africa to Makerere in Uganda and to Zaria in northern Nigeria. He was later director of the Bureau of Hygiene and Tropical Diseases and senior lecturer at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Ralph always retained a great love of Africa and spent many of his retirement days writing a dictionary of the nearly 1000 doctors who worked in tropical Africa. He was a man of strong Christian beliefs. He leaves a wife, Enid, and four children.
by Enid Schram and J D Roche