Hans Gerhart Kohler

Frank Alfred Schiess

Consultant orthopaedic surgeon Macclesfield (b 24 July 1940; q Middlesex Hospital, London, 1963), d 9 December 2004.

Frank Schiess was consultant orthopaedic surgeon to the Macclesfield hospitals for just short of 20 years. His particular interest lay with surgery of the spine. Initially, as in many district hospitals, he provided together with one other colleague and a registrar a full orthopaedic service including emergencies from what was then styled the casualty department.

As his career progressed, his opinion was increasingly sought after in legal quarters. The evidence that he presented was always researched with care, and delivered with clarity and a degree of forcefulness that was well received. It was while waiting in the ante-room to speak that he was seized by a fatal myocardial infarction on 9 December 2004.

Frank was born in Singapore. His parents were Swiss. In the face of the imminent arrival of the Japanese he, with his mother and little more than a teddy bear, escaped to Perth in Western Australia. All his life he remembered the warmheartedness of the welcome they received, and indeed paid a return visit there some eight years ago.

After the war in the Pacific was over, he and his mother moved back to Switzerland. His mother then secured work in Harley Street with Professor Keckwick. This early exposure to medicine led Frank to believe that that was where his future lay. He entered the Middlesex Hospital as a student, and graduated in 1963. He completed his house posts at the same hospital. It was during this period that he met an attractive staff nurse, Diana, and within a short space of time they were married.

Subsequent appointments were to the training programme at the Manchester Royal Infirmary, where the chief was David Lloyd-Griffiths. He completed his time at the infirmary with a period as lecturer.

Frank was an avid reader. He had a wide ranging knowledge of art, music, and particularly literature and also of Manchester United. His lively presence in his many spheres of activity is greatly missed, particularly by his wife and family. Deepest sympathy is extended to Diana, to his daughter, Fiona, also a Middlesex graduate, and to his two sons, Guy and Simon. [Robert Neill]