Barry j marshall autobiography sample

Professor Barry Marshall AC FRACP FRS FAA ( 30 September - ) Nobel Laureate - Medical Laboratory Scientist & Gastroenterologist

Introduction

Professor Barry Marshall is a Nobel Laureate, Clinical Professor and UWA Brand Ambassador at The University of Western Australia. Professor Marshall ( UWA graduate) and Emeritus Professor J Robin Warren were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for their discovery of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori (H.pylori) and its role in gastritis and peptic ulcer disease.

Marshall and Prof. Robin Warren showed that the bacterium Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) plays a major role in causing many peptic ulcers, challenging decades of medical doctrine holding that ulcers were caused primarily by stress, spicy foods, and too much acid. This discovery has allowed for a breakthrough in understanding a causative link between Helicobacter pylori infection and stomach cancer.

Education

Marshall was born in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia and lived in Kalgoorlie and Carnarvon until moving to Perth at the age of eight. His father held various jobs, and his mother was a nurse. He is the eldest of four siblings. He attended Newman College for his secondary education and the University of Western Australia School of Medicine, where he received a Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) in He married his wife Adrienne in and has four children.

 Marshall obtained a bachelor’s degree from the University of Western Australia in From to he worked at Royal Perth Hospital, and he later taught medicine at the University of Western Australia, where he also was a research fellow.

Opportunities & Experiences

In the early s Marshall became interested in the research of Warren, who in had first observed the presence of spiral-shaped bacteria in a biopsy of a patient’s stomach lining. The two began working together to determine the significanc

“The greatest obstacle to knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.”-Daniel Boorstein

Previously, four rather obscure physicians and their courageous acts have been described in this series. Barry Marshall is hardly obscure. Along with Robin Warren he won the Nobel Prize in Medicine for the discovery that H. pylori was the major cause of ulcers.  He has been the subject of numerous articles and interviews. However, his story is so compelling and his courage so remarkable, that it bears repeating.

Figure 1.  Barry Marshall (left) and Robin Warren (right) toasting their Nobel Prize.

Barry Marshall was an obscure medicine resident (registrar) in Perth, Australia in the early ’s. He had an unremarkable career as a medical student and as a resident (1). He was working 14 hour days, was married with 4 children, and his wife was finishing her degree in psychology.

Against this hectic background, he took a 6 month gastroenterology rotation during the later half of As part of his training, he was encouraged to perform a clinical research project each year and asked his supervisor, Dr Tom Waters, if there was a gastroenterology project he could work on. Waters showed him a letter from Robin Warren, a pathologist, which listed patients with curved bacteria present on their stomach biopsies and asked for someone to clinically follow-up the patients. This was radical stuff in the day. Stomachs were thought to be sterile because the acid killed any bacteria. Marshall was especially interested because one of the patients was a woman he had seen on the ward, who had severe stomach pain but no diagnosis. In desperation Marshall had referred her to a psychiatrist and commenced antidepressant medication for want of a better treatment. The only abnormal finding was some redness in the stomach and bacteria on the stomach biopsy.

He went to visit Warren in the basement of Royal Perth Hospital where the Pathology Department was lo

Australian physician (born )

For the South African cricketer, see Barry Marshall (cricketer).

Barry James Marshall (born 30 September ) is an Australian physician, Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine, Professor of Clinical Microbiology and Co-Director of the Marshall Centre at the University of Western Australia. Marshall and Robin Warren showed that the bacterium Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) plays a major role in causing many peptic ulcers, challenging decades of medical doctrine holding that ulcers were caused primarily by stress, spicy foods, and too much acid. This discovery has allowed for a breakthrough in understanding a causative link between Helicobacter pylori infection and stomach cancer.

Early life and education

Marshall was born in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia and lived in Kalgoorlie and Carnarvon until moving to Perth at the age of eight. His father held various jobs, and his mother was a nurse. He is the eldest of four siblings. He attended Marist College, Churchlands for his secondary education and the University of Western Australia School of Medicine, where he received a Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) in He married his wife Adrienne in and has four children, a son and three daughters.

Career and research

In , Marshall was appointed Registrar in Medicine at the Royal Perth Hospital. He met Dr. Robin Warren, a pathologist interested in gastritis, during internal medicine fellowship training at Royal Perth Hospital in Together, they both studied the presence of spiral bacteria in association with gastritis. In , they performed the initial culture of H. pylori and developed their hypothesis on the bacterial cause of peptic ulcers and gastric cancer. It has been claimed that the H. pylori theory was ridiculed by established scientists and doctors, who di