John Henderson was professor of paediatric respiratory medicine at the University of Bristol and a key figure behind the reorganisation of the medical school. Born in Glasgow, his father was Alexander Iain Henderson, a marketing manager; his mother was Margery May Charlotte Henderson, a housewife. After attending Archbishop Holgate’s Grammar School in York, he went to medical school in Manchester, qualifying in 1981.
After various junior hospital training posts in paediatrics, he went to Bristol in 1986 as a research fellow in child health under the watchful eye of David Baum. It was here and in his early clinical career that he developed his interests in respiratory medicine in children and moved towards the difficult side of clinical paediatrics, working in neonatology and intensive care. He was particularly focused on the physiology of breathing and lung function in tiny babies and children.
In 1989 he moved to the University of Western Australia as a research fellow in paediatric respiratory medicine and then returned to Scotland in 1991 as a lecturer in child health at the University of Aberdeen. In the same year, he also completed his MD at the University of Manchester.
He returned to Bristol in 1993, having been appointed as a consultant paediatrician at Southmead Hospital. In 1995 John made the unusual move from an NHS consultant post to an academic position, as a consultant senior lecturer in child health at the University of Bristol. John achieved internal promotion to reader (honorary consultant) in paediatric respiratory medicine in 2005 and to a professorship in 2009.
John focused his research on respiratory medicine and his early research career was based around understanding the physiology of the respiratory system in children and infants. Later, asthma became his main research interest and in parallel he started to move his clinical work towards this common and distressing condition.
John developed research expertise on the epidemiology of asthma and allergy in children, increasingly working with the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) from 1997 on, when he planned and hosted the first ALSPAC workshop on asthma and lung function. John became a co-applicant on the Wellcome Trust/MRC strategic awards that, after an initial period of a hand-to-mouth existence, emerged as the core support for ALSPAC on top of generous University of Bristol investment.
Within ALSPAC John established a programme of respiratory follow-up that included lung function measurements, assessment of allergies and longitudinal information on wheezing illnesses and asthma through childhood. He focused on identifying different phenotypes of asthma in early childhood and how genetics and environments influence their development. Through the ALSPAC cohort John also made substantial contributions to international collaborations to conduct genome wide association studies, known as GWAS, of asthma and allergies. He was a co-applicant on successful major funding bids from the MRC, the Wellcome Trust, the US National Institutes of Health and the UK National Institute for Health Research, among others. John published widely and extensively and was a much-sought after speaker at international meetings.
ALSPAC leadership changed, with George Davey Smith taking on the study director responsibilities and John became a co-director. In this role, he nurtured and developed key future leaders with encouragement and support, gently setting an example and always being available to help with any difficulties. An external review of ALSPAC operations in 2016 concluded a new study management strategy should be instigated, with George continuing as scientific director. At this point, John stepped in, took on the role of caretaker of the study, and formed a new board and approach to the management of the study – ultimately supporting Nic Timpson as the new principal investigator. No one could have supported Nic more closely than John, who not only aided this process but continued to offer help and advice through a period of considerable change.
In 2014, there was a major biomedical review at the University of Bristol, with a decision to create a single Bristol Medical School from the two existing schools (clinical sciences and social and community medicine), as well as creating a new faculty of health sciences. Bristol always trained good doctors who did well post-graduation, but the medical programme had been the subject of some poor General Medical Council (GMC) reports. There was clearly a need to do something with an impending GMC visit and, as a new entity, the Bristol Medical School was able to influence change.
About this time, John was moving away from clinical practice and NHS management. He continued to enjoy his research, but was keen to become more engaged with teaching. A solution was to move to a full-time academic role and to cease clinical work. As a great clinician and an academic with clear ideas about the training of tomorrow’s doctors, John was ideally positioned to take on a more pre-eminent position in medical education.
John and Eugene Lloyd were appointed to lead this change, charged with the gargantuan task of creating a curriculum that was fit for educating doctors who would practise medicine in the 21st century. At the time, John described the task as being akin to designing and building an aircraft after it has taken flight (while being shot at from the ground). Despite all the difficulties that Eugene and John faced, the new curriculum they developed has been much acclaimed. The first graduates are set to leave the medical school in 2022.
Bristol Medical School has had an excellent GMC report, much improved student satisfaction and sits in the higher reaches of the league tables. John was a major influence in all these changes. His leadership style was always to take responsibility and to be fair to all. Indeed, one of his characteristics was that he would always put others before himself and would not tolerate injustices or overclaiming credit for success. John was modest and honest, he remains one of the very few clinical academics who no one has ever said a bad word about and was fundamentally kind to everyone. These are very rare attributes in medical academia.
John’s dry sense of humour is well illustrated by an occasion when he was sitting in a fourth-year exam board as the names of failing students were revealed. When one name appeared (a member of a very well-connected family), John put his head in his hands and lamented: ‘Oh no, there goes my chance of ever getting a knighthood.’
John was an ardent supporter of Scottish rugby, which at times was a very difficult place to be. He was a keen cyclist and swimmer; his fitness was the envy of many. His family life was very separate from his work life. It was quite astonishing how little his family knew of his major achievements and influence, as well as the high esteem in which he was held by all his colleagues and students. This was typically John: he did not see his work as exceptional or that he was exceptional. He was someone we should all aspire to emulate.
John was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died in St Peter’s Hospice, Bristol at the age of 61, just a few weeks after his diagnosis. He was survived by his wife Nicky and his two sons, Finn and Ali. He was a dear friend to Bristol University, the faculty and the medical school and will be missed enormously.
Faculty of health sciences
[University of Bristol News Professor John Henderson, 1958-2019 www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2019/august/john-henderson.html – accessed 5 September 2019; The Telegraph 20 August 2019 www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2019/08/20/professor-john-henderson-expert-paediatric-respiratory-medicine/ – accessed 5 September 2019; BMJ 2019 366 5359 www.bmj.com/content/366/bmj.l5359 – accessed 5 September 2019]