{{Short description|British physician (1925–2004)}} '''John Farrar Soothill''' (20 August 1925 – 23 September 2004) was an English medical doctor. He began his career as a nephrologist and later became a paediatric immunologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital.
==Biography== John Soothill was born in 1925 in Blackheath, London.<ref name=independent>{{cite news|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/professor-john-soothill-544027.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220613/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/professor-john-soothill-544027.html |archive-date=2022-06-13 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|work=The Independent|title=Professor John Soothill|date=18 October 2004|accessdate=30 June 2019}}</ref> His father was the chief medical officer in Norwich and his grandfather, William Edward Soothill, had been the first professor of sinology at Oxford University.<ref name=bmj>{{cite journal|doi=10.1136/bmj.329.7478.1347|title=John Soothill|journal=BMJ|year=2004|volume=329|page=1347|last=Richmond|first=Caroline|pmc=534858}}</ref> He attended The Leys School, Cambridge, and in spite of his dyslexia went on to study medicine at Christ's College, Cambridge.<ref name=guardian>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/news/2004/oct/20/guardianobituaries.health|title=John Soothill|first=John|last=Skinner|work=The Guardian|date=20 October 2004|accessdate=30 June 2019}}</ref> He completed his national service in Germany, did his clinical training at Guy's Hospital and Lewisham Hospital.<ref name=bmj/> In 1955 he travelled to Chicago on a Fulbright Scholarship,<ref name=guardian/> where he studied the recently developed technique of renal biopsy.<ref name=independent/> Soothill began working at Birmingham University's experimental pathology department in 1956 as a nephrologist. His work at Birmingham centred around kidney disease, immunoglobins and the complement system. He also pioneered the use of cyclophosphamide in children with relapsing nephrotic syndrome.<ref name=bmj/>
In 1965, Soothill moved from Birmingham to the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health, where he was appointed the first Hugh Greenwood Professor of Immunology, a post he would hold for 20 years. One of his main achievements at Great Ormond Street was classifying the different subtypes of severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID).<ref name=bmj/> The disease, informally known as "boy in the bubble syndrome" after David Vetter, was given its current name by Soothill in the 1970s.<ref name=independent/><ref>{{cite book|first1=Amos |last1=Etzioni|first2=Hans D.|last2=Ochs|title=Primary Immunodeficiency Disorders: A Historic and Scientific Perspective|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SF9zAwAAQBAJ&pg=PR16|date=13 September 2014|publisher=Academic Press|isbn=978-0-12-411554-5|pages=xvi–xvii}}</ref> He also focused on childhood allergies, proposing the theory that allergies and eczema resulted from the exposure to allergens in the first six months of a baby's life.<ref name=bmj/><ref name=guardian/> He pioneered the use of elimination diets whereby a child with an unknown food allergy is denied all possible allergic sources in their diet, then each food is reintroduced one by one until the causative food is identified.<ref name=independent/>
Soothill retired in 1985 to Devon with his wife Brenda Thornton, whom he had married in 1951. He died on 23 September 2004 in Axminster.<ref name=independent/>
==References== {{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Soothill, John}} Category:1925 births Category:2004 deaths Category:British immunologists Category:British nephrologists Category:British paediatricians Category:People educated at The Leys School Category:Alumni of Christ's College, Cambridge Category:Medical doctors from Norwich Category:Physicians of Guy's Hospital Category:Physicians of Great Ormond Street Hospital