Macdonald Critchley CBE

CBE

CBE and C.B.E. are abbreviations for "Commander of the Order of the British Empire", a grade in the Order of the British Empire.Other uses include:* Chemical and Biochemical Engineering...

 (February 2, 1900 – October 15, 1997) was a British

Great Britain

Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

 neurologist

Neurology

Neurology is a medical specialty dealing with disorders of the nervous system. Specifically, it deals with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of disease involving the central, peripheral, and autonomic nervous systems, including their coverings, blood vessels, and all effector tissue,...

. He was former president of the World Federation of Neurology, and the author of over 200 published articles on neurology

Neurology

Neurology is a medical specialty dealing with disorders of the nervous system. Specifically, it deals with the diagnosis and treatment of all categories of disease involving the central, peripheral, and autonomic nervous systems, including their coverings, blood vessels, and all effector tissue,...

 and 20 books, including The Parietal Lobes (1953), Aphasiology, and biographies of James Parkinson

James Parkinson

James Parkinson was an English apothecary surgeon, geologist, paleontologist, and political activist. He is most famous for his 1817 work, An Essay on the Shaking Palsy in which he was the first to describe "paralysis agitans", a condition that would later be renamed Parkinson's disease by...

 and Sir William Gowers

William Gowers

William Gowers may refer to:*William Frederick Gowers, British colonial administrator*William Richard Gowers, Victorian era British neurologist*William Timothy Gowers, Fields Medal-winning British mathematician...

.

Macdonald Critchley was educated in Bristol

Bristol

Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...

 and received his medical degree there. His professional life centred on King's College Hospital and National Hospital, Queen Square "for the Paralysed and Epileptic", London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

. He was a Registrar

Specialist registrar

A Specialist Registrar or SpR is a doctor in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland who is receiving advanced training in a specialist field of medicine in order eventually to become a consultant...

 in 1927, and he was appointed to the staff as a physician in the following year and later became Dean of the Institute at Queen Square. His influence spread throughout the neurological world by teaching and writings and he later became President of the World Federation of Neurology.

During World War II he was a Consulting Neurologist in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve based at HMS Drake

HMS Drake

Nineteen ships and a shore establishment of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Drake after Sir Francis Drake or after the drake: was a 16-gun ship launched in 1653 and sold in 1691. was a 24-gun sixth rate launched in 1694 and wrecked later that year. was a 2-gun yacht launched in 1705. She was...

.http://www.unithistories.com/officers/RNVR_officersC.html

His contributions to knowledge depended not on technology, but on his power of observation and meticulous dissection of human sensibility and behaviour. The best known of his works were those on aphasia

Aphasia

Aphasia is an impairment of language ability. This class of language disorder ranges from having difficulty remembering words to being completely unable to speak, read, or write....

 and the parietal lobes. Headache was also one of his many interests. He started a Headache Clinic at King's College Hospital and was one of the founders of the "British Migraine Trust". He delivered a paper at the "First Migraine Symposium" in 1966 on "Migraine: from Cappadocia to Queen Square", combining his clinical interest with his love of history

History

History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...

. Critchley was a handsome and impressive figure, a superb speaker and a lifelong student of the human mind. His last book on the life and career of Hughlings Jackson, jointly with his wife Eileen, has been published posthumously.

Associated eponyms

• Adie-Critchley syndrome: A syndrome of forced grasping and groping.
• Klein-Levine- Critchley syndrome: A syndrome of hypersoomnia and hyperphagia
• Levine-Critchley syndrome: Acanthocytosis
  Acanthocyte
  Acanthocyte, in human biology and medicine, refers to a form of red blood cell that are spiked, or possess various abnormal thorny projections. Acanthocytosis is the condition with acanthocyte-like red blood cells....
  
  Neuroacanthocytosis with neurologic disorders detailed by Edmund Critchley not Macdonald Critchley).