Professor Iain T. Boyle, physician

Newspaper, January 1759; items relating to Glasgow Royal Infirmary 1792-1994; Letter regarding Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, 1820; article on the Glasgow Blind Asylum, c.1996; correspondence and papers relating to the RCPSG 1988-2001; picture and stamps relating to medicine, c.1950-2000; book of medical formulae, antedotes and medical remarks, 19th century.

Iain Thomson Boyle was educated at Paisley Grammar School and Glasgow University and gained a BSc(Hons) in 1959 and MB ChB in 1962. He became FRCP Glasg in 1974. After initial training in general medicine and endocrinology in Professor E M McGirr’s unit in Glasgow Royal Infirmary, he took an associate research post at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in London, working with Professor Iain MacIntyre. In 1970 he was awarded a scholarship to work in the laboratory of Professor Hector DeLuca of the department of biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Here his work led to breakthroughs in the understanding of Vitamin D metabolism and a revolution in the treatment of kidney and bone disease. On his return to Glasgow he established a clinic for metabolic bone diseases which grew to be the most influential in Scotland. He was President of the Bone and Tooth Society (the UK Society for Bone and Mineral Research), 1994-1996. He examined in medicine for the medical royal colleges and was the first vice-president (medical) of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow (1992-94) and was elected honorary librarian of that college in 1994, a post he held with distinction until his death. His vision led to the publication of Treasures of the College to commemorate the tercentenary of the College library in 1998. In 1976 he was appointed deputy medical adviser to the student health services at Strathclyde University, taking over as medical adviser from Professor W G Manderson in 1991. In 1994 he was appointed visiting professor in the department of pharmacology and physiology at Strathclyde University. He was awarded an honorary DSc by Strathclyde University in 2000.

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File relating to Professor Boyle in RCPSG 1/20/15