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BGS colleagues will share our sorrow at the death of Dr Peter Berman, Consultant Geriatrician and Director of the Stroke Unit at the City Hospital, Nottingham, from carcinoma of the prostrate, aged 54 years.

After studying at University College Hospital, Pete was drawn to geriatric medicine during junior posts in Bath and Bristol. He trained as a Senior Registrar in Oxford, where general and geriatric medicine were integrated. Never afraid to swim against the tide, Pete became an eloquent advocate for geriatric medicine as a distinct speciality that would allow him to concentrate on frail, complex patients and multidisciplinary work.

In 1986 he was appointed as Consultant Geriatrician at the City Hospital, Nottingham. Local discussions about stroke rehabilitation led Pete and colleagues to set up a randomised controlled trial of stroke unit care. The Nottingham trial, published in 1996, randomised 315 patients and showed significantly reduced disability and improved psychological outcomes for stroke unit patients. Pete joined the Stroke Unit Triallists’ Collaboration, and the Nottingham trial had an important place in the next systematic review of trials, published in 1997 in the BMJ, and highly influential in shaping services for stroke. Pete went on to publish, with international colleagues, a series of comparisons of the process of stroke care in different European countries.

Aside from the trial, Pete developed the craft of stroke rehabilitation with typical thoughtfulness about the patients’ experiences. The Nottingham Stroke Unit became a beacon of good practice, attracting visitors from around the world. Pete was active in stroke medicine’s march towards an established structure in the UK, serving on the executive committee of the newly founded British Association of Stroke Physicians. He was the principal architect of stroke services in Nottingham, and also contributed to the development of a needs-based geriatric medicine service, working closely with colleagues in general medicine. As a trainer, teacher and mentor, Pete inspired enormous affection as well as respect, and he served as Regional Adviser to the Royal College of Physicians.

Pete was very good company, knowledgeable about railways (after childhood adventures with steam), and about the history of everything. An enthusiastic and expert cyclist, he marked an all-too-brief remission by conquering an infamously strength-sapping climb in France, the Mont Ventoux.

He was delighted when the Nottingham Stroke Unit was named after him earlier this year, but reported with characteristically self-deprecating humour that “they only named it after me so that they could shut me down...!”. It was ‘standing-room only’ at a gathering held in early September, when friends, colleagues and family members, led by his wife Ditte and their three sons, celebrated Pete’s life.

Peter Berman, b 1953; q University College Hospital 1976; FRCP; d 11 August 2007.

BGS Newsletter, October 2007
Issue 13 ISSN 1748-6343 13