Colin Laverty

Colin Robert Andrew Laverty (26 May 1937 – 9 February 2013) was an Australian medical practitioner and was the first to confirm (using electronmicroscopy) that the human papillomavirus was much more common in the cervix than previously thought and, in 1978, he suggested that this Virus be considered as possibly involved in the causation of cervical cancer.

He was also a prolific art collector.

Laverty was born in Sydney, New South Wales, the son of medical practitioners Colin (Tas) Laverty and Beryl Laverty.

He attended Newington College (1949-1953) and then the University of Sydney.

Laverty recognised that cellular abnormalities known as koilocytosis and koilocytotic or "warty" atypia (first reported in the 1950s by Koss and associated with genital warts) were much more common in Pap smears than generally realised and that, surprisingly, in the great majority of cases clinical warts or condylomas were absent, even on careful clinical examination of the entire female genital tract.

This raised the possibility that genital infections due to wart or papilloma Virus were much commoner than previously thought, frequently cervical in location and very uncommonly of recognisable warty contour or configuration.

A researcher was employed and an electron microscopic technique was then devised which confirmed the suspicion that human papillomavirus (HPV) particles were present in these abnormal cells, in both cytologic and histologic preparations (Pap smears and cervical biopsies).

He graduated BSc(Med) with honours in 1959, Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery in 1962 and Diploma in Clinical Pathology in 1969 and subsequently obtained by examination Fellowship of the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia and a Diploma in Cytology from the same college.

He had the qualifications MB, BS; BSc (Med); Diploma in Clinical Pathology (DCP) (Syd); FRCPA; Post-Fellowship Diploma in Cytopathology (Dip.Cytopath.) (FRCPA).

While at the University of Sydney, Laverty was awarded a Blue for Rowing.

Dr Laverty graduated in medicine from the University of Sydney and then trained in pathology at Royal Prince Alfred and King George V Hospitals in Sydney, as well at St Mary’s Hospital, Manchester, in the United Kingdom.

He specialised early in gynaecological cytology and histopathology and became a Staff Specialist Pathologist at the Royal Women’s Hospital in Melbourne and later at King George V Hospital for Mothers and Babies in Sydney.

Laverty co-authored more than 50 scientific articles and was a frequent and often invited speaker at medical conferences in Australia and internationally.

During his career, Dr Laverty was for many years a member of the Advisory Committee to the Australian National Cervical Screening Program, multiple New South Wales Cancer Council Committees, the Committee of the Australian Society for Colposcopy and Cervical Pathology and the Continuing Education, Quality Assurance and Evolving Technologies Committees of the International Academy of Cytology.

In the mid-1970s, while working as a Specialist Gynaecological Pathologist at King George V Hospital in Sydney, Dr Laverty developed a special interest in the recognition in the Papanicolaou smear of various female genital tract infections, in particular those due to agents difficult or impossible to culture.

In the early 1970s it was thought that genital tract warts (condylomas) were quite uncommon, usually vulval and merely sometimes cosmetically distressing lesions.

In 1978, Dr Laverty was the first in the world to publish this finding.

Thus it was proven that atypical, potentially premalignant cells in cervical cytologic and histopathologic preparations in women without actual genital warts were in fact Virus infected and that this Virus had the electron microscopic appearances of papillomavirus.

At that time, electron microscopic demonstration of the Virus particles within the nucleus of the cell was the only available way of confirming papillomavirus infection.

In contradistinction to other viruses affecting the genital tract (e.g. herpes), confirmation by culture was not possible (and still is not possible) by conventional virological methods.

Nor could the diagnosis be confirmed by immunoperoxidase testing or by HPV DNA and RNA hybridisation techniques (the latter subsequently widely used), which at that time had not yet been developed.

Subsequently, the histologic features and colposcopic recognition and characterisation of this sub-clinical or non-condylomatous HPV infection of the cervix were established.

Recognition of the frequent and close association of these noncondylomatous HPV-induced changes with high grade cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) - which was and is accepted as preceding life-threatening invasive cancer - led Dr Laverty to also suggest in 1978 the investigation of the possible role of HPV in genital tract carcinogenesis.

Also, if cervical cancer proved to be due to, or required a Virus infection for its genesis, then prevention by immunisation was theoretically possible.

The suspicion and subsequent confirmation Dr Laverty that papillomavirus infection was much more common than formerly realised, that most infections were clinically invisible and at that time unknown to colposcopists, proved to be of profound clinical significance.

It changed the interpretation of Pap smears, cervical biopsies and colposcopic appearances and therefore the management of women with abnormal Pap smears.

It led to later research by others which resulted in the confirmation that this Virus was required for the genesis of cervical cancer (and how the Virus acts to do this).

This led ultimately to the development of a vaccine or vaccines which theoretically can eradicate the second most common female cancer worldwide.

Articles on quality assurance in cytology published by Dr Laverty and his team concerned the importance of targeted sampling of the transformation zone (where most precancer and cancer occurs), sampling implement choice, reporting terminology and management recommendations.

He was also interested in the cytologic recognition of cervical adenocarcinoma in situ (an important subset of cervical cancer precursors) and demonstrated a place for HPV in this form of cervical cancer also.

Dr. Laverty also evaluated new slide making and reading technologies, leading to improved Pap smear reporting accuracy and published some of the very first trials of ThinPrep and CytoRich, technologies which are now widely used throughout the world.

In 1982, he founded Dr Colin Laverty and Associates, a private pathology practice which provided specialised services in gynaecological cytology and histopathology.

Approximately 200,000 Pap smears were processed annually.

The practice provided referring general practitioners and gynaecologists with a great deal of educational material (newsletters, feedback on smear quality etc.) aimed at improving standards in cytology.

The practice employed a statistician and much clinical research was carried out in private practice (which is most unusual), with regular publications in Australian and prestigious overseas medical journals.

Over many years, Laverty lectured widely (often as an invited speaker) in Australia and overseas on the significance of HPV infection and on a range of gynaecological cytology and Pap smear screening issues.

In August 1998, his practice was sold to Health Care of Australia (HCoA).

Laverty was initially Medical Director of "Mayne Health – Laverty Pathology" in New South Wales.

The practice was renamed "Symbion Laverty Pathology" and subsequently onsold to Primary Health Care, a very large, statewide, general pathology practice which still bears Dr Laverty's name.

Laverty retired from practising medicine in the mid-2001 and, with his wife Elizabeth, managed their contemporary art collection, one of Australia’s best known.