David Cuthbertson

{{Short description|Scottish physician, biochemist, medical researcher and nutritionist}}

Sir David Paton Cuthbertson, CBE, FRSE (9 May 1900 – 15 April 1989)Adam Fleck, ‘Cuthbertson, Sir David Paton (1900–1989)’, rev. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/40065, accessed 29 Sept 2013] was a Scottish physician, biochemist, medical researcher and nutritionist who was a leading authority on metabolism. The Rowett Research Institute became one of the world's leading centres for animal nutrition research under Cuthbertson's leadership (1945–65).{{cite web|title=Sir David Cuthbertson|url=http://www.universitystory.gla.ac.uk/biography/?id=WH3012&type=P|work=The University of Glasgow Story|publisher=University of Glasgow|accessdate=8 January 2013|location=Glasgow}}

Life

David Cuthbertson was born in Kilmarnock the son of John Cuthbertson FRSE (1859–1933) a teacher in the fields of both mining and agriculture. David was educated at Kilmarnock Academy. He served in the Royal Scots Fusiliers during the First World War. This delayed his education and he then studied medicine at Glasgow University graduating MB ChB in 1926.{{Cite book |url=https://www.royalsoced.org.uk/cms/files/fellows/biographical_index/fells_indexp1.pdf |title=Former Fellows of The Royal Society of Edinburgh, 1783–2002: Part 1 (A–J) |author=C D Waterston |author2=A Macmillan Shearer |publisher=Royal Society of Edinburgh |isbn=090219884X |date=July 2006 |access-date=18 September 2015 |archive-date=24 January 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130124115814/http://www.royalsoced.org.uk/cms/files/fellows/biographical_index/fells_indexp1.pdf |url-status=dead}}

Cuthbertson served on several research and scientific committees, including secondment to the Medical Research Council in 1943, and served as vice-president of the Royal Society of Edinburgh from 1959 to 1960.

In his early research, in 1936, Cuthbertson observed a loss of nitrogen (urea) in fracture patients, later referred to as surgical stress.{{cite journal|last=Cuthbertson|first=DP|title=The disturbance of metabolism produced by bony and non-bony injury, with notes on certain abnormal conditions of bone.|journal=The Biochemical Journal|year=1930|volume=24|issue=4|pages=1244–63|pmid=16744448|pmc=1254622|doi=10.1042/bj0241244}}{{cite journal|last=Wilmore|first=DW|title=From Cuthbertson to fast-track surgery: 70 years of progress in reducing stress in surgical patients.|journal=Annals of Surgery|date=Nov 2002|volume=236|issue=5|pages=643–8|pmid=12409671|doi=10.1097/00000658-200211000-00015|pmc=1422623}} In this he was assisted by Hamish Munro.{{cite web |title=HAMISH NISBET MUNRO |url=http://rse.mtcserver6.com/cms/files/fellows/obits_alpha/munro_hamish.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171017202326/http://rse.mtcserver6.com/cms/files/fellows/obits_alpha/munro_hamish.pdf |archive-date=October 17, 2017 |url-status=dead}}

He was Director of the Rowett Research Institute from 1945 to 1965.

He was awarded several honorary doctorates: DSc from Rutgers University; LLD from Glasgow University; LLD from Aberdeen University; and Dhc from Zagreb University. In 1949 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were James Norman Davidson, Robert Garry, Ernest Cruickshank, and Donald McArthur. He served as the Society's vice president from 1959 to 1960.

He died on 15 April 1989, in Troon in Ayrshire.

Family

He married Jean Prentice Telfer in Arrochar on 7 September 1928; she died on 28 May 1987 in Troon. Jean and David are buried together at Arrochar Churchyard. Their son was the actor Iain Cuthbertson (1930–2009).