Dr William Basil Bacon
Personal Details
Dr William Basil Bacon MBChB FFARCS DA
(Known as Bill)
11/10/1897 to 19/12/1983
Place of birth: Manchester, England
Nationality: British
CRN: 722616
Education and qualifications
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General education |
After leaving school, Bacon delayed tertiary education by serving as a wireless operator on a trawler during the First World War. |
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Primary medical qualification(s) |
MBChB, Victoria University, Manchester, 1923. |
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Initial Fellowship and type |
FFARCS by Election |
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Year of Fellowship |
1953 |
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Other qualification(s) |
DA (RCP&S),1944. |
Professional life and career
Postgraduate career
Following graduation he undertook surgical house officer posts at the Royal Infirmary and St Mary’s Women’s and Children’s Hospitals, both adjacent to the university campus on Oxford Road in Manchester. Following this he held various resident medical officer posts at hospitals in Manchester including the Ancoats Orthopaedic Department, the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital at Pendlebury and the Crumpsall Union Infirmary (later known as North Manchester Hospital).
Following these posts he entered into a partnership in a general medical practice based in Withington, South Manchester. As mentioned in his obituary, it was quite common for general practitioners to administer anaesthesia when their patients required surgery during this period of medical history. Dr Bacon apparently demonstrated an aptitude for anaesthesia, even publishing a article in the BMJ describing an oxygen ether apparatus, shortly after his graduation in 1924, and he was encouraged to take up the field in a more specialist manner, becoming a visiting anaesthetist at St Mary’s Hospital.
Following this he also was appointed to additional visiting anaesthesia posts at the Royal Children’s, Royal Eye and Christie Cancer Hospitals in Manchester. As his hospital anaesthesia commitments increased, his general medical practice partnership with Dr Seed was dissolved with effect from 1 January 1946. After the inception of the National Health Service he became a consultant to the central United Manchester Hospitals and the Children’s Hospital. Dr Bacon retired from active clinical practice about 20 years prior to his death around 1962-63 aged approximately 65 years.
Professional interests and activities
He was a member of the Association of Anaesthetists and the British Medical Association. He was also a founder member of the Manchester and District Society of Anaesthetists when it was formed in 1945, and a fellow of the Manchester Medical Society. Dr Bacon had an aptitude for designing medical apparatus recorded with publications in the British Medical Journal. He designed a modification for administering ether in 1924, and a modification of an ear syringe for removing wax from the external aural canal in 1931; the “Bacon Ear Syringe” is still available from medical equipment suppliers. He also modified the Waters apparatus for thoracic surgery in 1949, and published a short commentary about the challenges of hypotensive anaesthesia. During his career he developed a respected reputation for his work with hypotensive anaesthesia for perineal surgery in collaboration with a gynaecological surgeon, Dr JWA Hunter; their collaborative work apparently attracted considerable attention.
Other biographical information
Author and sources
He married Kathleen Floyd in 1929 and they had four daughters.
In retirement he moved to the market town of Knutsford in Cheshire, where he passed away in 1983 at the age of 86. Kathleen and his four daughters survived him.
Author:
Dr Innes Simon Chadwick
Sources and comments:
Obituary. British Medical Journal. 1984: Vol 288: 11th February: p496.
Bibliographic and genealogical information accessed on-line Ancestry.com.
The GMC Medical Registers 1929-40 accessed on-line Ancestry.com
The Medical Directory 1925, 1930, 1935, 1940, 1942 accessed on-line Ancestry.com
Notice of dissolution of medical practice of WB Bacon and NF Seed. London Gazette 28 December 1945.
The Medical Directory 1968 124th issue. Churchill, London. vol1 page 85.
Bacon WB. An Oxygen and Ether Apparatus. BMJ 1924: p673.
Bacon WB. Preparations and Appliances, Ear Syringe. BMJ 1931. January 10. p61
Bacon WB. Preparations and Appliances. A Modified Waters Apparatus For Thoracic Surgery. BMJ 1949. October 15. P868-9.
Bacon WB. (Letter). Dangers of Induced Hypotension. BMJ 1954. May 22. p1210.