Lauriston Shaw was born in London, the son of Archibald Shaw, medical practitioner, of St. Leonards. After an early education at the City of London School and University College, London, he studied medicine at Guy’s Hospital, qualifying in 1881. His progress through the usual junior appointments at Guy’s was interrupted by a voyage to Australia, which he made in the capacity of ship’s surgeon, to recuperate his health. But in 1889 he was appointed assistant physician and demonstrator of morbid anatomy. He was an active dean of the Medical School between 1893 and 1901, promoting the erection of new buildings and the purchase of playing fields for the School. He was made full physician in 1907 and consulting physician in 1919. At the beginning of his career Shaw was also assistant physician to the City of London Hospital for Diseases of the Chest. He was prominent in framing the provisions of the National Health Insurance Act of 1911 and consequently found himself in opposition to large numbers of his colleagues and friends. From 1915 to 1923 he gave devoted service as a manager of the Metropolitan Asylums Board. Shaw’s qualities of disinterestedness, vision and courage well fitted him for his responsibilities as an organiser and as a chairman. He married May, daughter of Howard Spalding, and had one son. He died at his home in Weybridge.

G H Brown

[Lancet, 1924; B.M.J., 1924; Presidential Address to R.C.P., 1924, 26]