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David Nunes Nabarro FRCP (27 February 1874 – 3 October 1958) was a British physician who was the first bacteriologist at the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children in London, and the hospital's first director of pathology. In 1903, he with David Bruce, Aldo Castellani and Cuthbert Christy established that sleeping sickness was caused by the blood parasite, Trypanosoma, and that it was transmitted by tsetse fly.

Biography

Nabarro was born in London to business parents. He was homeschooled till the age of 10. He entered Dame Alice Owen's School in Herdfordshire for secondary education and completed matriculation in 1890. With Andrews Scholarship, he joined the University College Hospital, London, from where he obtained a B.Sc. with honours in chemistry in 1893, at age 19. He qualified an M.B. in 1898 and travelled to the Far East to study tropical diseases. He briefly worked as house physician and demonstrator at UCH.

Nabarro earned an M.D with gold medal in 1899. The same year he joined the faculty of the University College, London as an assistant professor of pathology. As he earned a Doctor of Public Health degree in 1901, he was inducted a member of the Royal College of Physicians, and Membership of the Royal Colleges of Physicians. He immediately worked as the first pathologist at the Evelina London Children's Hospital.

In 1905, Nabarro worked at West Riding Asylum at Wakefield. Before long he was appointed pathologist at the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, where he worked till his retirement in 1939.

Scientific contributions

During his studies at University College Hospital, he worked with Leonard Hill of University College, London on the principle of respiration in brain and muscle, the study of which was published in The Journal of Physiology in 1895. While working at UCL, he published papers on the nature of abnormal hearts. He investigated cases of infections with hog cholera, dysentery in children, In 1939, with his assistant Derrick Edward at the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, he reported a case of accidental injection malaria in a child.

Nabarro investigated cases of tuberculosis that were spread through contaminated butter in 1905. One of his major research areas was on syphilis in children on which he wrote several papers, and culminated in publication of a classic monograph titled Congenital Syphilis in 1954.

Sleeping Sickness Commission

The Royal Society constituted the second Sleeping Sickness Commission in the early 1903. Nabarro was appointed "Head of the Commission" on 5 January. But Nabarro, on concern that he was not senior to the other members in age and service, asked the Royal Society to make someone else as the head. Upon the request of the Royal Society, the British War Office appointed David Bruce of the Royal Army Medical Corps was then appointed leader of the team in February. Bruce and Nabarro joined Castellani and Christy on 16 March. The Commission successfully investigated the etiology of the disease as an infection with the protozoan parasite known as Trypanosoma gambiense. By August 1903, Bruce and his team established that the disease was transmitted by the tsetse fly, Glossina palpalis.

Awards and honours

Nabarro was elected member of The Physiological Society in 1897, and Fellow of the University College Hospital in 1900. He became Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in 1917.

References

1. ^ Signy, A. G. (1959). "David Nunes Nabarro". Journal of Clinical Pathology. 12 (1): 98–99. doi:10.1136/jcp.12.1.98. PMC 479864. PMID 13631093.
2. ^ Lumsden, W. H. (1974). "Some episodes in the history of African trypanosomiasis". Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine. 67 (8): 789–796. doi:10.1177/003591577406700846. PMC 1645813. PMID 4607392.
3. ^ Signy, A. Gordon (1959). "David Nunes Nabarro". Journal of Clinical Pathology. 12 (1): 98–99. doi:10.1136/jcp.12.1.98. PMC 479864. PMID 13631093.
4. ^ O'Connor, W. J. (1991). British Physiologists 1885-1914: A Biographical Dictionary. Manchester University Press. pp. 162–163. ISBN 978-0-7190-3282-0.
5. Hill, L.; Nabarro, D. N. (1895-07-18). "On the Exchange of Blood-Gases in Brain and Muscle during States of Rest and Activity". The Journal of Physiology. 18 (3): 218–229. doi:10.1113/jphysiol.1895.sp000563. ISSN 0022-3751. PMC 1514638. PMID 16992251.
6. Nabarro, D. (1903). "Two Hearts showing Peculiarities of the Great Veins". Journal of Anatomy and Physiology. 37 (Pt 4): 382–391. PMC 1287132. PMID 17232576.
7. Lawrence, T. W.; Nabarro, D. (1901). "A Case of Congenital Malformation of the Heart, with Abnormalities of Abdominal Viscera: Absence of Spleen, Absence of Hepatic Section of Inferior Cava". Journal of Anatomy and Physiology. 36 (Pt 1): 63–75. PMC 1287221. PMID 17232497.
8. Nabarro, David; White, P. Bruce; Dyke, S.C.; Scott, W.M. (1929). "Two Cases of Human Infection by the American Hog-Cholera Bacillus". The Lancet. 214 (5539): 868–870. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(01)07467-0.
9. Nabarro, D.; Signy, A. G. (1932). "Observations on Dysentery in Children". Archives of Disease in Childhood. 7 (42): 327–334. doi:10.1136/adc.7.42.327. PMC 1975245. PMID 21031906.
10. Nabarro, David; Edward, Derrick G.FF. (1939). "Accidental Transmission of Malaria to a Child by the Injection of Blood". The Lancet. 234 (6053): 556–558. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(00)73942-0.
11. Nabarro, D. (1932). "Congenital Syphilis". Postgraduate Medical Journal. 8 (85): 400–405. doi:10.1136/pgmj.8.85.400. PMC 2532111. PMID 21312763.
12. Nabarro, D. (1933). "Third-Generation Syphilis". The British Journal of Venereal Diseases. 9 (1): 1–30. doi:10.1136/sti.9.1.1. PMC 1046769. PMID 21773508.
13. Nabarro, D. (1934). "Discussion on the Treatment of Congenital Syphilis". The British Journal of Venereal Diseases. 10 (1): 1–15. doi:10.1136/sti.10.1.1. ISSN 0007-134X. PMC 1052941. PMID 21773531.
14. Nabarro, D. (1931). "Some Pitfalls in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Inherited Syphilis". The British Journal of Venereal Diseases. 7 (1): 1–24. doi:10.1136/sti.7.1.1. ISSN 0007-134X. PMC 1046686. PMID 21773474.
15. F.J.G.J (1955). "Book Review: Congenital Syphilis". Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine. 48 (3): 225. doi:10.1177/003591575504800313. S2CID 209364272.
16. ^ J.R. B. (1932). "Sir David Bruce. 1855-1931". Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society. 1 (1): 79–85. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1932.0017. ISSN 1479-571X. JSTOR 768965.
17. Welburn, S. C.; Maudlin, I.; Simarro, P. P. (2009). "Controlling sleeping sickness - a review". Parasitology. 136 (14): 1943–1949. doi:10.1017/S0031182009006416. PMID 19691861. S2CID 41052902.
18. Steverding, Dietmar (2008). "The history of African trypanosomiasis". Parasites & Vectors. 1 (1): 3. doi:10.1186/1756-3305-1-3. PMC 2270819. PMID 18275594.

• 1874 births
• 1958 deaths
• Fellows of the Royal College of Physicians
• English bacteriologists
• African trypanosomiasis