| Description | Strong was born in Kells, Ireland and, after an education in England, returned to Ireland to study medicine at Trinity College, Dublin, graduating just before the war.
Having obtained a pilot's licence just before the war, Strong applied for the Royal Air Force, but it was oversubscribed so, instead, he joined the RAMC. He was responsible for setting up two hospitals in Assam, which treated refugees fleeing the Japanese advance, and he commanded a casualty clearing station near the front lines.
Back in civilian life, he trained at the West London Hospital on Hammersmith Road before he was interviewed in 1948 by Sir Stanley Davidson, then professor of medicine at the University of Edinburgh. Sir Stanley appointed him senior lecturer in medicine, along with the post of honorary consultant physician at the Western General Hospital, affiliated with the university. At the Western, he raised funds for a metabolic unit to study patients with such conditions as diabetes and obesity. He was involved with the University of Edinburgh for more than 60 years. He was given his own personal chair as professor of medicine in 1966 and, after retirement, was named professor emeritus in 1981.
From 1976-83, he was a member of the UK Medicines Commission (now part of the Commission on Human Medicines), which advises government ministers on the regulation of medicinal products.
An expert in endocrinology he was widely known in the medical, scientific and academic communities for helping discover chromosomal abnormalities that explained certain "intersex" or other congenital syndromes. One of his most famous publications, jointly written with Dr PA Jacobs in Nature magazine in 1959, involved chromosome abnormalities in males with Klinefelter's syndrome -also known as XXY Syndrome, when males have at least one extra chromosome, which can lead to infertility.
From 1979-82, he served as president of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, where he was a driving force behind the creation of the Queen Mother Conference Centre, whose foundation stone was laid in 1994. He also played host to the Queen when she visited the Royal College to mark its tercentenary in 1981.
He was an honorary fellow of the American College of Physicians, of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland, of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, of Trinity College, Dublin, and of several other institutions. He was also for many years a member of the Lothian Health Board.
Having been awarded an MBE for his military service with the Royal Army Medical Corps in 1942, he was appointed CBE [Commander of the British Empire] in 1978 for his civilian medical work.
[Source: The Scotsman, 27th December 2012]
Contents: Research papers, 1949-1983; government enquiry papers, 1978-1988; papers of non-governmental organisations, 1972-1989; papers relating to the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, 1971-2005; reprints of articles by Strong, 1949-1983 |