Sheila Sherlock

Dame Sheila Patricia Violet Sherlock DBE, FRCP FRCPE FRS HFRSE FMGA FCRGA (31 March 1918 – 30 December 2001) was a British physician and medical educator who is considered the major 20th-century contributor to the field of hepatology (the study of the liver).

Sheila Sherlock was born in Dublin on 31 March 1918, the only daughter of Violet Mary Catherine (née Beckett) and Samuel Philip Sherlock, an army officer then serving as a lieutenant in the 1st Cavalry Reserve.

Her family moved from Ireland to London soon after her birth and she attended private schools in the city until her family moved in 1929 to the village of Sandgate, Kent.

In Kent, she was educated at the Folkestone County School for Girls.

In the early part of the twentieth-century female applicants to medical schools were at a great disadvantage, and from 1935 to 1936 Sherlock attempted to enter several English medical schools but was rejected.

In 1936 she was accepted for a place to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh.

Her ability became evident, and she graduated in 1941 finishing top of her year.

She was awarded the Ettles Scholarship, being only the second woman to have done so.

She remained in Edinburgh to take up the post of Assistant Lecturer in Surgery offered to her by Professor Sir James Learmonth, and published her first paper with Learmonth in 1942.

She later recounted that Learmonth had taught her how to conduct and document research.

In the same year she was appointed House Physician to Professor Sir John McMichael at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith Hospital.

In this post she worked on hepatitis, which she was able to continue from 1943 to 1947 with funding from the Medical Research Council and subsequently with the award of the Beit Memorial Fellowship.

She was awarded her MD with a thesis on The Liver in Disease: with special reference to aspiration liver biopsy, receiving a Gold Medal from University of Edinburgh.

She conducted research into portal hypertension, hepatic encephalopathy and ascites at this time.

In 1947 she spent a year at Yale University's School of Medicine as a Rockefeller Travelling Fellow, working on carbohydrate metabolism and liver disease.

She returned to London and in 1948 was appointed Lecturer in Medicine and Consultant Physician at Hammersmith Hospital.

In 1951, aged 33, she was elected as a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, making her, at the time, the youngest woman to receive this qualification.

On 15 December 1951, Sherlock married Dr Geraint "Gerry" James, a physician and researcher into sarcoidosis.

They had two daughters Amanda and Auriole, and two granddaughters.

Although occasionally referred to as Mrs Sheila James she generally preferred to be known by her maiden name, and was one of the first female professionals to follow this pattern.

Her most widely known book, Diseases of the Liver and Biliary System, was first published in 1955.

In 1959, she became the United Kingdom's first ever female Professor of Medicine when she was appointed at the Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine in London.

She founded the liver unit which was located in a temporary wooden structure on the roof of the hospital in Gray's Inn Road.

Despite its location, the department attracted trainees from around the world, and many current leaders in the field of hepatology spent time there.

Research in several different areas of liver disease was undertaken: including; bilirubin metabolism, haemochromatosis, cholestasis, drug-induced liver disease, albumin synthesis, portal hypertension and ascites, autoimmune liver disease and its treatment with corticosteroids, and the use of liver biopsy in the diagnosis of liver disease were all studied.

She delivered several of the Royal College of Physicians lectures including the Bradshaw Lecture (1961), Humphry Davy Rolleston (1968) and Lumleian Lectures (1978) and Harveian Oration (1985).

Sherlock was known as a clear and succinct writer, and she published over 600 papers in scientific journals.

In 1974 the department moved to the new hospital in Hampstead, where it was situated close to the clinical wards, on the 10th floor.

Research continued there, with viral hepatitis, liver transplantation and endoscopic treatment of varices all becoming important areas of study.

She retired from the Chair of Medicine in 1983, but continued to see patients, conduct research, and write.

At the Royal Free, she was succeeded by Neil McIntyre.

It was written solely by her until the 9th edition in 1993, and is now in its 13th edition as of 2018.

She was also editor of Gut and the Journal of Hepatology.

On 30 December 2001, Sherlock died in London from pulmonary fibrosis, two weeks after her golden wedding anniversary.

Her daughter Amanda, a Baptist minister, conducted her funeral.

When Sherlock started her medical career, little was known about liver disease.

Her work helped to establish hepatology as a medical specialty.

She pioneered the use of needle liver biopsy, which had been used purely as a research tool, based on the technique of Sir John McMichael.

Her approach improved the understanding of the pathology of liver disease and it continues to be used in the diagnosis of liver diseases today.

The liver unit that she set up at the Royal Free Hospital became the centre for both research into liver disease and the education of trainees in the specialty.