Heather Ashton was professor of clinical psychopharmacology at the University of Newcastle, with a special interest in addictive drugs, particularly benzodiazepines, prompting a change in medical practice in withdrawal methods. In 1999 she wrote Benzodiazepines: How They Work and How to Withdraw, also known as the Ashton Manual – this was translated into 11 languages and remains free today to help people struggling with withdrawal from the drug.
Chrystal Heather Ashton was born on 11 July 1929 in Dehradun, northern India, the daughter of Sir Harry George Champion, who later became Professor of Forestry at Oxford University, and Chrystal (née Parsons). Heather was sent to America at the start of the second world war and attended Swarthmore High School in Swarthmore, a town on the outskirts of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
She returned to England to study medicine at Somerville College, Oxford University, where she gained a first class honours BA in physiology in 1951, and an MA and her medical degree in 1954, with clinical experience at the Middlesex Hospital in London. Heather was a gifted student, winning prizes in medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynaecology, psychology and pharmacology. She was also a squash ‘blue’ at Oxford, continuing to play the sport for many years. While at Oxford she met and married John Ashton, who later became professor of agricultural economics at Newcastle University, and they had three sons and one daughter.
Trainee roles were spent at the Middlesex Hospital as house physician from 1954 to 1955, house surgeon at the Royal Surrey County Hospital in Guildford and casualty medical officer back at the Middlesex in 1956, where she stayed for another two years as a Leverhulme Research Scholar.
In 1961 she became a lecturer in pharmacology at the Middlesex Hospital Medical School, before moving to Newcastle-upon-Tyne with the family to take up the position of part-time lecturer in pharmacology at the University of Newcastle from 1965 to 1970, developing expertise in psychoactive and addictive drugs. In 1974 she was promoted to senior lecturer in the same discipline, and in 1975 as a consultant in clinical psychopharmacology.
From 1982 to 1994, Heather ran an unusually specific clinic for patients trying to withdraw from benzodiazepines – in 2008 she described how this came about:
‘I was to run and work in a general pharmacology clinic and, one day a lady came in who’d been in a traffic accident. She was in plaster, and she had been put on Ativan by the surgeons ... for muscle relaxation. And she said, ‘You know, I can’t get off this drug. I’m starting to crave every time the next dose is due. I think I’m addicted. Can you help me?’ And well, I was young and naive in those days, and I said yes. But it was difficult. After her, there was a stream, and then a flood; a torrent of patients coming in and saying ‘These benzos don’t work anymore, they were super at first, but now I’m getting more anxious, and all sorts of other things.’ And so that’s how this clinic started. We had to devote a whole clinic just to benzos. In fact, I ended up doing it two sessions a week for years.’1
The clinic and her other research on psychotropic and addictive drugs including nicotine and cannabis led to over 200 journal articles, chapters and books, including over 50 papers concerning benzodiazepines alone. The key innovation in her work was to support patients by first switching from whatever benzodiazepine they were on to diazepam, then slowly ‘tapering’ off the drug over a period of months and even years to avoid the severe side effects, as opposed to the tendency of doctors to stop prescribing benzodiazepines suddenly. Other doctors and experts were sceptical at first, but over the years her approach became accepted and in 2013 the British National Formulary changed its official advice to doctors to only prescribe the drug for a very short period of time.
In 1999 she wrote Benzodiazepines: How They Work and How to Withdraw, also known as the Ashton Manual, which was translated into 11 languages and updated, this became the basis for modern practice in the withdrawal of benzodiazepines. On her death, patients from many countries wrote heartfelt tributes to Heather, her perseverance in the face of opposition, and how her work had changed, and in some case saved, their lives.
In addition to her clinical and academic work, she was on the executive committee of the North East Council on Addictions, helped set up the British organisation Victims of Tranquillisers (VOT) and gave evidence to select committees on tobacco smoking, cannabis and benzodiazepines. Her interests included squash, tennis and badminton, gardening and family.
Heather died on 15 September 2019 (she was predeceased by John in 1986), leaving daughter Caroline, sons Andrew, James, and John and six grandchildren.
RCP editor
Sources/further information
1https://www.benzoinfo.com/heather-ashton/
https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(19)33150-2.pdf
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2019/nov/18/heather-ashton-obituary