Thomas Inglis Robertson practised medicine in Sydney as consultant physician for forty years from 1952. At no time in all those years was he ever surpassed for his passion for his calling. “My love affair with medicine began as soon as I started my course in 1940 and continued unabated throughout my whole working life… I left the active medical scene at the end of 1992, consumed by the same degree of clinical curiosity that came over me when I made my first excursion into the wards as a raw undergraduate”. So he wrote in the introduction to his monograph, Hippocrates on Macquarie, Sydney 1945-49, Five years in the life of a resident doctor, published just after his death.

He was proud of his family tradition in medicine. His son James Harmston graduated in medicine in 1990 from the University of New South Wales, as the fifth generation . The line began in Glasgow with James Robertson born in 1807, who took the FRCS Edinburgh. Robertson’s father was a pediatrician who practised in the northern NSW town of Lismore where Thomas and his brother, James Struan were born. His mother was the former Elizabeth May Brown. Robertson was educated at the Sydney Church of England Grammar School and entered the Sydney University Faculty of Medicine to take the foreshortened wartime course in 1940. He became a junior resident medical officer at Sydney Hospital in 1945 and began a long and fruitful association with that institution. During his clinical pathology attachment he met his wife to be, Elizabeth Harmston, a scientist in the microbiology section.

He revelled in his clinical attachments and his encounters with the dominant honorary specialists of the time. He went to Melbourne to successfully sit the MRACP examinations in 1949, had a brief experience of obstetric medicine at Sydney’s Crown Street before travelling to the post war hot house of London medicine to take the MRCP in 1951. Here was born his interest in clinical haematologv in which he excelled for the rest of his practising life.

He had planned to enter rural practice as a physician on returning from England but fortuitously, a temporary relieving post became available at Sydney Hospital and soon he obtained a permanent appointment as an honorary physician. His career burgeoned as his skills as clinician and teacher were recognised. He made particularly important contributions to the RACP, recognised by his award of the College Medal in 1988. He was a member of the Board of Censors for eight years, served on and chaired the Asian-Pacific Committee and was a Member of the Specialist Advisory Committees in General Medicine and Infectious Disease, and the Therapeutics Advisory Committee. These activities were reflected in his influence as a teacher of medical students and mentor for trainee physicians. He was direct and demanding of high standard and would say “don’t muck about, get on with it” when confronted by vascillation.

He was an active collaborator in clinical studies. He coauthored a landmark paper aplastic anaemia and thymoma, as well a numerous studies in leukaemia and lymphoma. He was a committed participant at international haematology conferences and his opinion was a regular essential at his departmental meetings.

He was particularly proud of his involvement as a Board member of the Royal Flying Doctor Service, and occasionally indulged his strong family involvement by taking one of his children on trips to the outback. He was a member of the prestigious National Drug Evaluation Committee for sixteen years and chaired the Adverse Drug Reactions sub committee. He was influential in the development of rational cancer treatment during this period, and his impact was enhanced through his membership of the editorial board of the Australian Prescriber.

He retired from active practice in 1992 to indulge his love of reading, writing and fishing at his north coast retreat near his birthplace. He could not stop contributing however, as senior examiner for the Australian Medical Council and on the Medical Board of NSW Medical Tribunal and Professional Standards Committee. In a letter written shortly before his death about the latter work he said he was lukewarm at the start but found it absorbing and discovered a talent for managing the difficult and traumatic encounters to his satisfaction.

Such was the man, forever unselfish, committed, scholarly and loved. He left his wife Betty, their five children, Ian, Janet, Malcolm, James and Sarah, and many friends and admirers.