Progress Medels

Progress Medal 2005 is awarded to
Philip Goddard Ransley

FRCS, FAAP (Hon).
Director & Senior Consultant, Department of Paediatric Urology Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, London, U.K.

Anglo-American Paediatric Urology has matured a great deal since the lines of Americans going to London and Liverpool for advanced training in Paediatric Urology have dwindled over the years. One of the main reasons for this phenomenon has been the contribution of Philip Goddard Ransley FRCS, FAAP (Hon). I feel I can speak without prejudice on this subject and with some authority as I received my basic Paediatric Urology education a few hundred miles northwest in Liverpool with Mr. J Herbert Johnston one of the two doyens of our speciality. Philip took up the entire dual mantle for English Paediatric Urology when both Sir David Innes Williams and Herbie Johnston retired. Philip then emerged in American parlance as a true “Triple Threat” as a surgeon, scholar and thinker.

  

As a surgeon, Philip has travelled the world performing surgery and has trained numerous overseas visitors both at the GOS, Guys and Portland hospitals. As a scholar, Philip has contributed many manuscripts which have been published in all major urological, nephrology and Paediatric Surgery journals. As a thinker, Philip has always questioned traditional ideas and has made several unique observations, which have survived scientific scrutiny and also withstood the test of time.

As an academic I have the pleasure to sit on two subcommittees of the Professorial Promotions Committee here at Johns Hopkins. By all criteria that we use for promotion to full professor: (1) scholarly achievement, (2) contributions to one’s field and (3) international reputation, Philip meets or exceeds each criteria. The fact that he has not been appointed as the second Professor of Paediatric Urology in the United Kingdom is not due to any shortcoming on his part as he is richly deserving of this honour. Nonetheless, with his many achievements both at home and abroad and his major contributions to our field we dedicate this issue of “Progress in Paediatric Urology” to Philip Goddard Ransley our colleague, friend and our well deserved “International Professor of Paediatric Urology.

A tribute by John P Gearhart, MD, FAAP