Dr Phyllis Mary Edwards

Personal Details

Dr Phyllis Mary Edwards BSc MBBS FFARCS MRCS LRCP DA

29/07/1911 to 24/01/2003

Place of birth: Clutton

Nationality: British

CRN: 561857

Previous/other family name: Baptised, and recorded by University of Western Australia & Medical Register, as ‘Phyllis Mary’, but school & medical school both have her listed as ‘Phyllis May’.

Education and qualifications

General education

St Saviour’s & St Olave’s School, Southwark; Woodford County High School; University of Western Australia; King’s College Medical School, London

Primary medical qualification(s)

MRCS LRCP, 1937

Initial Fellowship and type

FFARCS by Election

Year of Fellowship

1951

Other qualification(s)

BSc(Hons), University of Western Australia, 1931

Professional life and career

Postgraduate career

Initial appointments included house surgeon at Princess Elizabeth of York Hospital for Children in London, house physician/obstetrician at Chelmsford & Essex Hospital, and working for the EMS at the County Infirmary, Cambridge. Early in WW2 she joined the RAMC and advanced from Lieutenant to half Colonel, working primarily in India. At the end of WW2 she worked for the EMS again in the King’s sector in London before being a registrar at King’s and then consultant to the West Middlesex Hospital from 1948. Between 1953 & 1958 she was Senior Lecturer, University College, Ibadan in Nigeria, before returning to London as consultant at Harrow Hospital. In 1968 she returned to Nigeria as professor & head of the anaesthetic department at Ahmadu Bello University, serving as dean of the medical faculty before retiring in 1971.

Professional interests and activities

She had a major involvement in the training of anaesthetists for other counrties, starting at the Anaesthesiology Centre in Copenhagen, founded by the World Health Organisation in 1950, and continuing with visits to many countries and her two appointments in Nigeria.

Other biographical information

Her father, a Clerk in Holy Orders, worked in Australia from 1926 to 1933.  She does not seem to have married, but adopted, as 'Paulette Edwards', a young woman who had grown up in an orphanage. 

Author and sources

Author: Prof Tony Wildsmith

Sources and any other comments: Obituary. BMJ 2003; 326; 398 where a photograph may be seen| Ancestry.co.uk | Archives of St Saviour’s & St Olave’s School, University of Western Australia, and King’s College, London | Boulton TB. The Association of Anaesthetists of GB&I 1932-1992 and the Development of the Specialty of Anaesthesia. London: AAGB&I, 1999