George David Pollock

FRCS Fellowship of the Royal Colleges of Surgeons (FRCS) is a professional certification, professional qualification to practise as a senior surgeon in Republic of Ireland, Ireland or the United Kingdom. It is bestowed on an wikt:intercollegiate, ...

(1817 – 14 February 1897) was a British surgeon, known as a pioneer of skin grafts.

Biography

Born in India as the second son of the British officer

George Pollock Field Marshal Sir George Pollock, 1st Baronet, (4 June 1786 – 6 October 1872) was a British Indian Army officer. He first saw action at the Battle of Deeg and at the Siege of Bhurtpore during the Second Anglo-Maratha War before taking part ...

, George David Pollock was sent to England for his early education and then apprenticed to a rural physician. He received medical education at

St George's Hospital St George's Hospital is a large teaching hospital in Tooting, London. Founded in 1733, it is one of the UK's largest teaching hospitals. It is run by the St George's University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. It shares its main hospital site i ...

and was made M.R.C.S. in 1840. After serving at St George's Hospital as House Surgeon to Sir Benjamin Brodie, Pollock went to Canada in 1843 to serve in the post of Resident Physician to the Governor-General of Canada, Lord Metcalfe, who had cancer. In 1845 Lord Metcalfe, accompanied by Pollock, returned to England. After Lord Metcalfe died in 1846, Pollock became Assistant Surgeon at St George's Hospital and, with several promotions, served there until his retirement in 1880. Upon the retirement of Thomas Tatum in 1867, Pollock became the surgeon in charge of ophthalmic cases and operated for cataracts. Also at St George's Hospital he was Demonstrator of Anatomy under Prescott Hewett and succeeded him as lecturer on Anatomy. At the Hospital for Sick Children in Great Ormond Street, Pollock had an appointment as a Surgeon and performed cleft-palate operations. He contributed the articles "Injuries of the Abdomen", "Diseases of the Mouth, Pharynx and Oesophagus", and "Diseases of the Intestines" in

Holmes Holmes may refer to: People and fictional characters * Holmes (surname), a list of people and fictional characters ** Sherlock Holmes, a fictional detective * Holmes (given name), a list of people * Gordon Holmes, a penname used by Louis Trac ...

and Hulke's ''A System of Surgery: Theoretical and Practical'', 3rd ed, 1883.Pollock, George David – Biographical entry – Plarr's Lives of the Fellows Online
/ref> In 1846 Pollock was made F.R.C.S. He was President of the

Pathological Society The Pathological Society is a professional organization of Great Britain and Ireland whose mission is stated as 'understanding disease'. Membership and profile The membership of the society is mainly drawn from the UK and includes an internatio ...

in 1875–1877 and President of the

Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society The Royal Medical and Chirurgical Society of London (RMCS), created in 1805 as the Medical and Chirurgical Society of London, was a learned society of physicians and surgeons, that received a Royal charter in 1834, and a supplement charter in 190 ...

for the years 1886 and 1887. He married in 1850 and upon his death in 1897 was survived by his widow and three of his five children.

The Pollock graft

In 1869

Jacques-Louis Reverdin Jaques-Louis Reverdin (28 August 1842 – 9 January 1929) was a Swiss surgeon who was a native of Cologny. He studied at the University of Paris, becoming an interne of hospitals in 1865. In 1869 he became an assistant to Jean Casimir Félix Guyo ...

developed a successful method for the

allograft Allotransplant (''allo-'' meaning "other" in Ancient Greek, Greek) is the Organ transplant, transplantation of cell (biology), cells, Biological tissue, tissues, or Organ (anatomy), organs to a recipient from a genetically non-identical donor of ...

of human skin. Based upon Reverdin's work, Pollock in May 1870 performed the first such successful operation in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. Many British surgeons adopted the technique and for many years what was called the "Reverdin graft" or the "pinch graft" outside the UK was called the "Pollock graft" in the UK.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pollock, George David 1817 births 1897 deaths 19th-century British surgeons British medical writers Fellows of the Royal College of Surgeons of England Physicians of Great Ormond Street Hospital Younger sons of baronets