William Pryse-Phillips

William Pryse-Phillips is emeritus Professor of Medicine (Neurology) at Memorial University, St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada. After leaving Guy’s in 1961 for house jobs in Winchester he returned to train in psychiatry first at Guy’s and then at the University of Birmingham and then in Medicine with Arnold Bloom at the Whittington and in Neurology, with PK Thomas at the Royal Free. With an MD, MRCP and DPM (later MRC Psych.) he emigrated to Canada in 1970 to complete neurological training at Queen’s and McGill universities before his appointment at Memorial in 1972, where he has remained since.

His books published over the last 40 years are Epilepsy (John Wright, Bristol, 1969); Essential Neurology (with Dr. TJ Murray; 4th English edition 1993, Elsevier; also one Arabic and two Spanish editions); and Companion to Clinical Neurology (1994, Little, Brown; Japanese edition 1998; 2nd edition 2003, 3rd edition 2009, Oxford University Press). He described and named the Olfactory Reference Syndrome in 1971 but his other (over 120) peer-reviewed journal publications and book chapters have dealt with migraine, multiple sclerosis, genetic conditions such as myotonic dystrophy and hereditary neuropathies, medical ethics and neurological history. He was University Orator at Memorial University from 1977 until his retirement in 2006.

Married in 1977, (but divorced 20 years later) he has three children – Gwyneth, a financier; Amy, an environmental engineer; and Sam, a film-maker. They all call St. John’s home but actually live variously between here, Toronto, Vancouver and/or wherever the next shoot is located.

Dr. Pryse-Phillips’ interests outside medicine include cooking, extreme gardening, long-distance walking, skiing, salmon fishing, iconoclasm and writing books for pleasure and for children.

Malcolm Forsythe

Public health attracted me as a career out of sheer frustration as to what was happening in the NHS, and particularly general practice in 1965. I had a marvellous mentor John Revans who sponsored me for a year at the School of Public Health at Chapel Hill NC. I always believed when Regional Director for Public Health for the South East Region (1978-1992) that I had the best job in the NHS. The 3000 consultant medical staff employed included many Guys graduates and, of course, I became closely associated with Kings, St Thomas’ and Guys’ medical schools, their hospitals and their subsequent development. Health, competence and conduct issues of medical staff became a major part of my workload. Nothing gave me greater satisfaction than seeing a colleague deemed, by local staff, as unsuitable to continue in medicine return to work. I moved to a chair at the University of Kent with two days a week at Kings. I researched health and stress issues in the medical profession. Finally after retirement in 2001 I enjoyed chairing a Primary Care Group/Trust in Kent which was where I landed my first Medical Officer of Health post in 1974.
John Butterfield helped me publicly in several tricky situations and it gave me great joy as a Governor when John, as Chairman of the Governors, officiated in the ceremony in Southwark Cathedral when my youngest daughter graduated.

Trish my second wife for 27years has been tremendous support and the photo taken last month is of her sitting between two statues in Bond St and whispering something to herself like “ If only”.

Lawrence Youlten

I only remember one question from my admission interview in 1953: “Is your father a Guy’s man?” My answer, “No, but my dentist is” was evidently enough to get me in. Just as well, as I didn’t know any other medical schools, and hadn’t applied anywhere else. I lived in Hendon, NW London, and used to see Tony Bron on the Underground nearly every morning on the way to Guy’s. Student life was a succession of Rugby matches, (not a single Englishman in the first XV, S African pack, Welsh backs and Irish full back), Saturday night hops and pub lunches, interrupted by the odd lecture or practical class. Many of us smoked, even in practical classes, and Prof Hunt told us we ought to stop, but balanced this by exposing us to carcinogenic fumes preparing smoked paper for physiology tracings.
Guy’s pre-registration house jobs included three months in Casualty, during which time I commuted by train from Hastings. A three-month season ticket was £30 which was nearly a month’s salary. I was married, by then, with a two-year old daughter. Felicity and I were living in a flat under Steve Haynes and his family at Vauxhall when Nigel Knight came down in a taxi at 1 am to tell me Felicity had given birth. I was a student on the Obs & Gynae firm, so had unlimited visiting rights for the fortnight Felicity and Madeleine spent in Victoria Ward; no complications, that was the norm. Our other two children were born in our flat in Trinity Street, where we entertained some of you. Life then became rather a blur with successive and parallel jobs as physiologist, pharmacologist, GP calls and surgeries, (remember Alan Pollock?), police surgeon, clinical pharmacologist and eventually Consultant in Allergy, thanks to Maurice Lessof’s invitation to come back to Guy’s in 1977. I’m still working one or two days a week, and enjoying my five day weekends in East Sussex. Here’s Felicity in our garden with Samiran Nundy, not so many years ago.