| Description | Watson was born in 1870 and was educated at George Watson's College and at Edinburgh University, where he won the Wightman prize in clinical medicine on graduating MB, CM in 1892. After serving as house-physician at the Royal Infirmary and at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children he was elected F.R.C.P.Ed. in 1901 and proceeded to the MD in 1904.
For a time he worked on nutritional problems in Sir Edward Sharpey-Schafer's laboratory, and for this research he was awarded the Alvarenga prize by the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. After his election to the visiting staff of the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, Chalmers Watson was active in promoting scientific methods in hospital practice; he exercised much influence upon students as a clinical teacher and became senior lecturer in clinical medicine in the university. He joined the BMA [British Medical Association] in 1897 and was elected secretary of the Section of Pharmacology and Therapeutics at the Annual Meeting held in London in 1916. He was the original editor of the 'Encyclopaedia Medica' published in fourteen volumes, of which a second edition appeared in 1915-25. His numerous published writings included 'Food and Feeding in Health and Disease', which reached a second edition in 1913, and a small volume, 'Lectures on Medicine', a handbook for nurses; also 'The Book of Diet'. A clear and fluent writer, he was a strong advocate of reform in medical education and keenly interested in student activities, both athletic and social.
He died on 6th April 1946 at Fenton Barns, Drem, East Lothian.
[Source: British Medical Journal obituary] |