A Liverpool Exemplar - Robert James Minnitt

Robert James Minnitt was born in Preston, Lancashire on the 25th of October 1889. His Irish paternal great grandfather's name was Molloy but changed it to Molloy-Minnit when he married a Miss Minnitt. Robert originally went up to Trinity College,Cambridge to prepare for the ministry; his father and grandfather were vicars; but changed his mind deciding that he could better serve as a doctor although religion remained an important part of his life. He entered Liverpool Medical School and qualified in 1915 before marrying Eileen Dooley in 1916 and they had three daughters and a son. Thereafter, he worked in the Liverpool hospitals, first as a junior doctor and later as an honorary anaesthetist. He was a founder member of the Liverpool Society of Anaesthetists in 1930, the first provincial society of its kind in England. Although The David Lewis Northern Hospital was the main focus of his anaesthetic work and was where he became Director of Anaesthesia, in 1933, he also became the first Lecturer in Anaesthesia to the University in 1933 and the first anaesthetist 'to be a member of the Faculty of Medicine, and later was also Lecturer in Obstetric Analgesia at the Liverpool Maternity Hospital. Like most anaesthetists of his day he was in general practice, with his surgery at his home at 73 Kremlin Drive, Liverpool where he lived for 65 years and continued for a small group of patients until his death.

Robert is viewed as the UK pioneer of inhalational analgesia in obstetrics and is best known for the introduction of 'Gas and Air' analgesia in labour in 1932-4, inventing the original 'gas and air' machine used for pain relief during labour. At that time most of Great Britain's poor and working-class women gave birth at home with the aid of a midwife. Because the popular 'twilight sleep' for labor pain was administered only by physicians, effective pain relief during childbirth was generally not available to these women. Dr. Minnitt’s refusal to accept this disparity inspired him to design and build, in conjunction with London scientific instrument-maker Charles King, to be manufactured by the The British Oxygen Co., London as 'The Minnitt Apparatus' offering adequate relief of pain without the loss of consciousness of the patient. The apparatus was well received and popular and by March 1936, 400 apparatuses were employed in various parts of the world and Dr Minnitt was able to give details of 1025 deliveries in Liverpool with satisfactory results. His persuasion of the Central Midwives Board in 1934, that after suitable training it was safe for midwives to supervise this method of analgesia, was probably the greatest contribution to the relief of pain since the discovery of anaesthesia. He also designed a machine which became the mainstay of the Ambulance Service, 'The Stephenson's Minuteman', a portable Oxygen therapy unit that could be used in any environment.

Robert worked tirelessly to develop and promote the technique with lectures, papers & films, and identified its potential for use in other areas of practice, especially trauma. However, perhaps even more important was his influence as a teacher of safe and scientifically-based anaesthesia which led to his becoming a member of that small group which laid many of the foundations of modern anaesthesia in the 1920s and 1930s. One of the founder members of the Liverpool Society of Anaesthetists, formed in 1930, the oldest society of its kind in the country, he was an active member for over 30 years. In addition, he revised Ross & Fairlie’s ‘Handbook of Anaesthesia’ for its fifth edition, and in 1944 rewrote much of it with John Gillies for the sixth edition when it became known as the ‘Textbook of Anaesthesia’, the standard work of the day. During and after WW2 he played the major role in both establishing the University Department of Anaesthesia in Liverpool

Unlike the other eminent practitioners of the time he did not give up general practice to concentrate on anaesthesia with the inception of the NHS in 1948, just the opposite, as he believed that the new arrangements for hospital work (fixed sessional commitments) interfered with the relationship between patient and doctor. He sadly resigned his hospital and university appointments in order to concentrate on his private general practice. He received many academic honours, such as honorary fellowship in his own faculty in the Royal College of Surgeons, a fellowship in the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and an honorary M.Sc in his own university. He was a member of Council of the Association of Anaesthetists from 1941 to 1944 as well as President of the Liverpool Medical Institution in 1955 when he received the first College Foundation Council Award..

He died on the 21st of February 1974 aged 84, survived by a wife, son and three daughters. Dr Minnitt was a man of outstanding integrity who completely and selflessly dedicated his life to his profession and to the service of his patients. Throughout his life he remained active in the church and as a lay preacher was frequently asked to address various congregations, including those at St Luke's Church, Formby, where his father had been a clergyman. In his latter year his life was saddened by the illness of his wife and daughter. Professor Cecil Gray, good friend and an admiring colleague said of him, "If a man's stature in our profession is to be measured by the amount of suffering he has relieved then Minnitt's stature is indeed great".

see also:- http://www.thefootballvoice.com/2020/12/a-liverpool-exemplar-margaret-beavan.html