Biography

Biography

Personal details:

Born London, June 17 1948
Educated at the City of London School 1960-67
Married with one son

Medical education:

1967-1973: Preclinical studies, Trinity College, Cambridge University; clinical studies, St Thomas’ Hospital Medical School, London University.

Degrees:

BA (Cantab) 1970, BCHIR (Cantab) 1973, MB (Cantab) 1974, MA (Cantab) 1974, MRCP (UK) 1975, MD (Cantab) 1983, FRCP (UK) 1990.

Medical posts:

  • 1973-1983: Training medical posts at St Thomas Hospital, the Manchester Royal Infirmary, the Churchill Hospital in Oxford, St Steven’s Hospital in Chelsea, the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery Queen Square and Maida Vale, Kings College Hospital in London and the University of Virginia USA.
  • 1983: Appointed Consultant Neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, and Senior Lecturer in Neurology at the Institute of Neurology, Queen Square London, where he has worked ever since.

Professorial positions:

  • Awarded Personal Chair in Neurology at the Institute of Neurology in 1995, then the Established Chair in Clinical Neurology at UCL and Chairmanship of UCL University Department of Clinical Neurology in 1998.
  • Visiting professorships held at the universities of Auckland, Keele, Melbourne and Singapore

Other honorary and secretary of state appointments have included:

  • President Joint Neuroscience Council
  • Harveian Librarian and member of Council, Royal College of Physicians
  • President, Neurosciences Section, Royal Society of Medicine
  • Medical Director of the National Society for Epilepsy
  • Chairman, Medical Committee, National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery
  • Vice President and Member of the Executive Committee of the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE)
  • Joint Editor-in-Chief of the scientific journal Epilepsia
  • President and secretary of British Chapter of International League Against Epilepsy
  • Non-Exec Director of the Royal National Orthopedic Hospital NHS Trust
  • Guarantor of Brain
  • Clinical SubDean and Postgraduate Tutor for UCL Institute of Neurology Clinical Clinical Lead of eBrain
  • Member of the Medical Panel of the Driving and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA)
  • Member of the Medical Panel of the Disability Living Allowance Board

Prizes awarded have included:

  • 2016 – Epilepsy Excellence Award (an annual prize awarded by the British Chapter of ILAE for lifetime contribution to epilepsy and epilepsy research)
  • 2011 – TS Srinivasan Award (a prize awarded by the TS Srinivasan Foundation for Lifetime Achievement in neurological research)
  • 2010 – Lennox Prize (an annual prize awarded by the American Epilepsy Society for lifetime contribution to epilepsy and epilepsy research)
  • 2008 – European Epileptology Prize (a prize awarded every two years by the ILAE Commission on European Affairs for lifetime contribution to epilepsy and epilepsy research in Europe)
  • 2000 – Gopalakrishna Foundation endowment for Lifetime Achievement
  • 1995 – Ambassador for Epilepsy award, by the ILAE

Teaching and education:

  • 1983-2017: Training of junior staff in neurology, and especially in the field of epilepsy. Over 200 specialist registrars have passed through his service during this time.
  • 1987-2015: Principal supervisor of the PhD (or MD research) degrees of 27 doctors of whom: 23 are now consultant neurologists with an interest in epilepsy, 6 hold university chairs and 3 are now Deans or Directors of their home departments.
  • 2003-2016: Clinical SubDean at the UCL Institute of Neurology, a post with oversight of the training of postgraduate research students, UCL Faculty Divisional Graduate Tutor, Chair Education Committee, Director of the boards of examiners of four UCL MSc degrees.
  • 1983-2018: Invited lectures widely in Britain and internationally (over 250 lectures in different medical and clinical conferences/workshops/courses).
  • 2009-2018: Clinical Lead in the e-Learning project e-Learning in Healthcare and ebrain
  • 1982-present: Membership or Chairmanship on the organising or scientific committees of over 60 congresses including ILAE congresses at national, regional and international levels, NATO scientific congress on Magnetic Resonance Scanning in Epilepsy, nine London-Innsbruck Colloquia on Status Epilepticus

Research:

  • In his University appointment he has led a research team in the field of clinical and translational research in epilepsy. This research has included work on epidemiology, clinical pharmacology and therapeutics, magnetic resonance imaging, aetiology and health service policy.
  • History of neurology and epilepsy since 1860.
  • His research has been supported by grants from Brain Research Trust, British Epilepsy Association Research Foundation, Sir Jules Thorn Charitable Trust, Action Research, Wellcome Trust, Medical Research Council, NATO Scientific Division, UK Government Department of Health, UK Government Department of Trade and Industry, European Community, Patrick Berthould Trust, National Health Service Executive, industry, Susan Wright estate, and National Society for Epilepsy.

Editorships:

  • 2006-2013: Editor in Chief of Epilepsia
  • Membership of editorial boards of  the following scientific journals: Brain, Current Medical Contents – Neurology, Epilepsy Research, European Neurology, Epilepsia, Epilepsy and Behavior, Human Genomics, Neurocritical care
  • Editor of following series: Current Opinion in Neurology, epilepsy, 500 reflections on the Royal College of Physicians, Epilepsia supplements

Personal interests:

A longstanding interest in, and support of, disability rights, human rights and free speech. He has been a member of Amnesty International and Index On Censorship and supporter of libel reform campaign and charities for neurological disease, epilepsy, head injured and disabled children. He has served on the Board of Governors of two British epilepsy charities, the Epilepsy Society and the Action Epilepsy.

His main interests outside medicine are in writing, printing, music and bibliography. The focus of the latter being in the British fine presses of the late 19th and 20th centuries, including the Eragny, Vale, Ashendene and Doves Presses, and the contemporary work of Susan Allix, Old School Press, Whittington Press and others. He is a supporter of the Pissarro archive at the Ashmolean Museum and has written on the life of Lucien Pissarro and the history of his printing press, the Eragny Press. His musical interests are in twentieth Century European Classical Music (and was the guest on the radio programme Private Passions on 12 August 2000, discussing this).

Read a full list of publications here

My career in the field of epilepsy

My whole clinical career has been as a neurologist with a special interest in epilepsy. I was first introduced to epilepsy as a research registrar supervised by Dr EH Reynolds, and then in 1978 pursued my training as a registrar and lecturer at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London, under the supervision of Prof RW Gilliatt. In 1983, I was then appointed as a Consultant Neurologist and clinical academic at the National Hospital and have worked there, and for a period at its linked Chalfont Epilepsy Centre, ever since. In this post, I engaged in research, education and administrative duties, and clinical work. For 40 years I had a large NHS clinical practice and over the years I have made tens of thousands of consultations with people with epilepsy, and I hope in so doing have improved lives.

Epilepsy is a complex condition with many social and personal as well as medical implications. My practice of epilepsy has afforded me a privileged insight into all aspects of the condition, and I am enormously grateful to Dr Reynolds, Professor Gilliatt, colleagues at Queen Square and in the ILAE, and especially to my patients for the understanding and intuitions they have provided. Over the years I have written books and papers on medical aspects of epilepsy, its causes and treatment, and my last book, The Idea of Epilepsy, is a summary of its modern history – vital in my opinion for understanding the current position of epilepsy.

My research has been clinically based, and its greatest impact has been in the topics of: monotherapy in epilepsy, the epilepsy treatment gap (carrying out the first research into this and introducing the term), epidemiological cohort studies, studies of mortality and life expectancy, clinical trials of levetiracetam an topiramate, magnetic resonance imaging, status epilepticus and epilepsy therapeutics. In recent times too I have researched into the history of epilepsy and neurology.

My professional administrative activities in epilepsy have been carried out mainly as Director of the Chalfont Epilepsy Centre, on the Executive Committee of the ILAE where I served for 20 years, as Editor-in-Chief of EPILEPSIA and the ILAE Commission on European Affairs (now ILAE Europe) of which I was the founding chairman, and as Chair of Neurology at UCL.

I have lectured extensively over the years and trained many young doctors, and in doing so have tried to instil values of truthfulness, intellectual rigour and honesty which I believe should be the core of all work in medicine.

National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery and the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology, Queen Square London (1978-present)

The National Hospital was founded in 1860, as the National Hospital for the Relief and Cure of the Paralysed and the Epileptic (and changed its name on a number of future occasions). It was the first hospital devoted to epilepsy in the world and within a few decades of its foundation has established a world-wide reputation for its clinical work, education and research. It formed a medical school in 1895 and this was transformed ini= 1950 into the postgraduate Institute of Neurology. In 1996, the National Hospital was incorporated into UCLH and in 1997 the Institute of Neurology became a division of UCL. I was appointed in 1983 as a Senior Lecturer and Consultant Neurologist at the National Hospital and its Institute, and this post carried with it the directorship of the Chalfont Centre for Epilepsy which was partly administered by the National Society for Epilepsy, a National Charity. I was appointed to build up the epilepsy portfolio in the hospital and initiate a programme of epilepsy research in the university. An Epilepsy Research Group was formed which merged the resources of the hospital, the university department and the National Society for Epilepsy, and this unique tripartite arrangement provided the stimulus and resources for a rapid expansion of epilepsy activities. A very large outpatient service developed and there was established an epilepsy surgery programme, an EEG telemetry unit, a pharmacology and therapeutics laboratory, an epilepsy assessment unit and a neuroepidemiology unit. A successful nation-wide appeal was launched in 1990, and an MRI unit devoted to epilepsy research, the first in the world, was opened on the Chalfont site. Major research grants funded the research programme and by 1997, the research group contained 15 senior and over 70 junior persons. I was appointed to the established Chair of Neurology at the Institute of Neurology in 1998 and relinquished the headship of the Epilepsy research Group. In the last 20 years, the research, education and clinical activities of the group have continued to expand and the Queen Square team group remains a global centre for epilepsy research, training and clinical work. Over 10,000 patients remain on active follow up each year, it has been my professional home since 1978, and I am enormously grateful to the hospital and institute, and to the Chalfont Centre, and to my colleagues and patients for their support and encouragement in all my work. In 2004 I was appointed SubDean at the Institute of Neurology and in this position also lead the MSc course in Neurology and initiated a distance learning MSc. I also co-published a book Queen Square: a history of the National Hospital and its Institute of Neurology (Cambridge University Press) in 2019, in part intended as an act of obeisance and gratitude to these two institutions which remain at the centre of my work.

National Neuroscience Institute in Singapore (2000-2002)

In 2000, I was given the opportunity of secondment from UCL to assume the Directorship of the National Neuroscience Centre in Singapore. It was hoped this temporary post would forge a collaboration between the two institutions. A grant was awarded by the Singaporean funding agency and a joint research project launched. Unfortunately, this was not viewed favourably by my then Singaporean deputy, Dr Lee Wei Ling. Dr Lee is the sister of the then Singaporean Prime Minister and daughter of the then Senior Minister, Lee Kuan Yew. Out of the blue, allegations were made about the ethics of the programme. These were totally unjustified in my view but were accepted by the Singapore Medical Council and I was expelled from the post in 2003. In the opinion of many this was politically motivated and resulted from personal issues, but I cannot comment on this. On my leaving, Dr Lee took over the Directorship of the National Neuroscience Institute from me.

The case was then investigated by the UK General Medical Council (GMC) which dismissed any impropriety. The GMC decision was challenged in a Judicial Review by the Singaporean Medical Council and this challenge was also comprehensively dismissed. It was gratifying to be totally exonerated by two senior and independent statutory public bodies. In these proceedings, reports were written by 6 world-leading research authorities, including Prof Sir Richard Doll who found no evidence of any professional or research misconduct and concluded: ‘I cannot see any grounds on which Professor Shorvon can be accused of unethical behaviour’.

In the end justice was done. The underlying reasons for this affair are well understood by all those who know the mechanics of Singaporean society. Academic medicine anywhere can be a cut-throat affair and it at times such as these that one really values the support of colleagues and friends around the world. I am especially grateful to my employers, University College London (UCL) who endorsed my position, supported and then appointed me as Clinical Sub Dean in addition to my existing post as Professor in Neurology. Also, I would like to thank my professional organisation, the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE), for their support and endorsement. The ILAE then did me the honour of appointing me as Editor-in-Chief of their scientific Journal Epilepsia. The ILAE European chapters awarded me the European Prize in Epileptology in 2008, the American chapter the Lennox Prize in 2010 and the British ILAE chapter the Excellence in Epilepsy Prize in 2016. Although the affair was at times a surreal experience, many good things accrued and the balance sheet is positive.

See:

http://www.nature.com/news/2006/061222/full/news061218-15.html and

http://www.asiasentinel.com/politics/london-calling/