29 Facts About Victor Dubowitz

Victor Dubowitz was born on 6 August 1931 and is a British neurologist and professor emeritus at Imperial College London.

Victor Dubowitz is principally known along with his wife Lilly Dubowitz for developing two clinical tests, the Dubowitz Score to estimate gestational age and the other for the systematic neurological examination of the newborn.

Victor Dubowitz was educated in Beaufort West Central High School in South Africa.

Victor Dubowitz graduated Doctor of Medicine from the University of Cape Town in 1954, and moved to the United Kingdom in April 1954 to gain some clinical experience, and culture and theatre.

Victor Dubowitz planned to return to South Africa after 18 months and return to general practice there, but never did, as he encountered Sir Francis Fraser at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School who directed him into a position at University Hospital Lewisham working as an ophthalmology locum.

Victor Dubowitz later took another locum position at New End Hospital in Hampstead.

Victor Dubowitz married Lilly Magdalena Suzanne nee Sebok in July 1960, who was a paediatrician.

Victor Dubowitz started his clinical career in 1954, after graduating in medicine, as a resident in medicine and surgery at Groote Schuur Hospital, for the standard 6 months period in each specialisation.

Victor Dubowitz started his UK clinical career in 1958 with 3 week locum position at Queen Mary's Hospital where he saw his first case of Muscular dystrophy in two wards of patients, he became a paediatric resident a subject where he been involved in clinical and research aspects of muscle diseases ever since.

Victor Dubowitz remained at this position for two years before becoming a lecturer and a houseman for a year as a clinical pathologist at the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases, later called National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, performing muscle biopsies.

The thesis was based on Victor Dubowitz's pioneering histochemical studies and sponsored by Professor Everson Pearse, on developing and diseased muscle.

Victor Dubowitz continued in that position for another two years before being promoted to a reader in Child Health and Developmental Neurology, at Sheffield, a position Dubowitz held until 1972.

In 1973, Victor Dubowitz applied and received the Chair of Paediatrics and Neonatal Medicine at the Postgraduate Medical School of Hammersmith Hospital, now part of Imperial College London.

Victor Dubowitz was a founding member of the British Paediatric Neurology Association and the president from 1992 to 1994.

In 1996, Victor Dubowitz was made professor emeritus of paediatrics at the University of London.

Victor Dubowitz was honorary member of the European Paediatric Neurology Society since 2005.

Victor Dubowitz was president of the Medical Art Society from 1997 to 2000.

From 1972 to 1996, Victor Dubowitz was the director of Muscle Research Centre.

From 1999 to 2003 Victor Dubowitz was president and later honorary member European Neuromuscular Centre in The Netherlands.

From 1972 to the present, Victor Dubowitz has been an honorary consultant paediatrician at the Hammersmith Hospital.

The syndrome that eventually became the Victor Dubowitz syndrome was first described in 1965.

Victor Dubowitz held a clinic in cystic fibrosis and noticed a baby girl born at full term at Jessop Hospital who weighed around 3 to 4lbs.

Victor Dubowitz commented that the baby had an unusually shaped face, recessive and it's an unusual face, with odd ears and a particular nose, and doesn't quite fit in and the mother commented that her previous child had a similar shaped face.

Victor Dubowitz being interested in the case, through his cystic fibrosis clinic, researched all the different face shapes within syndromes of dwarfism and found that none matched.

Victor Dubowitz decided to write a Case report, that was published in the British Journal of Genetics.

The idea for the World Muscle Society began in 1995, when Victor Dubowitz discussed the formation of a new society with the pediatrician Luciano Merlini, principally due to the quickening of medical advances in the field and it was felt that the interval between the 4-year meetings of the World Federation of Neurology was too long.

Victor Dubowitz felt that a new multidisciplinary society was needed that would meet frequently and focus more on the current research community rather than established figures in the medical community.

Victor Dubowitz further discussed the proposal with Italian pediatrician Giovanni Nigro and later with the French pediatrician George Serratrice in Marseille while travelling.

Victor Dubowitz wrote to 60 potential members asking the following two questions:.