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Obituaries

Donald Gwynvor Craig

BMJ 2013; 347 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.f4308 (Published 24 July 2013) Cite this as: BMJ 2013;347:f4308
  1. Neil Wilson

Donald Gwynvor Craig was in practice first in Solihull, West Midlands, and subsequently became senior partner at Thamesmead, London, where he was senior lecturer at Guy’s Hospital Medical School. He enjoyed his varied work as a teaching general practitioner, police surgeon, venereologist and colposcopist and was an incisive and popular occupational health doctor.

He sought out knowledge and new medical skills throughout his working life and retirement and inspired medical students and trainees at every turn. In the early 1960s he devised his own written self help guides, educating his patients and urging them to deal with the irritations of mild disease without irritating the doctor. Supported by his enormous medical experience with supporting academic qualification, he was not a believer in health check-ups for well people and displayed a healthy scepticism for perceived medical wisdom.

As a child he was evacuated to extended family on the Isle of Arran. A Balliol education, National Service in the Welsh Guards combined with lifelong Methodism, and an obsession with the inspiring fortitude of Shackleton taught him the perseverance to work long hours in his many different roles and the confidence to practise medicine into his 70s. He was supported throughout by his first wife, Jill, who predeceased him and who spent many hours driving him to his duties at the police stations of south London. He treasured family holidays sailing in Cornwall from his beloved Percuil River. Latterly with his second wife, Juliet, he rambled the Malverns, where he could be witnessed addressing their dog, Homer, in Latin. His last five years were packed with educational holidays, crafting baskets, weaving, embroidery, and playing the bass recorder.

He leaves Juliet, four daughters (one a Nightingale) from his first wife; 11 grandchildren; and two great grandchildren.

Notes

Cite this as: BMJ 2013;347:f4308

Footnotes

  • Former general practitioner (b 1929; q Balliol College, Oxford/St Thomas’ Hospital, London, 1954; MA, FRCGP, DRCOG, DMJ Soc Apoth Lond, Dip Ven Soc Apoth Lond, , D Occ Med RCP Lond), died from septicaemia on 28 April 2013.

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