1878 - 1934
Co-founder of the British Journal of Urology in 1929
Francis Seymour Kidd was born on 30 March 1878, the son of Dr Joseph Kidd. He was educated at Winchester and Trinity College Cambridge and then the London Hospital.
After being appointed to position as Registrar at The London, he spent some time in Berlin where he was very impressed by the German school of Urology. In June 1910, he became Assistant Surgeon to the London Hospital being appointed Full Surgeon in 1917. In 1913, he founded the Genito-Urinary Department at the London. His enthusiasm for urology was started by his old boss Hurry Fenwick.
By the end of 1920, he found that his health was unable to stand the strain of both his private practice and his arduous work at the Hospital; so on medical advice he resigned from the Hospital Staff, although he remained a Consulting Surgeon to St. Paul’s Hospital.
In 1920 Kidd, was a member of the Organising Committee that founded the Urological Section of the Royal Society of Medicine and was its President in 1927.
His name will always be associated with the "Kidd's Ball", a diathemy ball used via a cystoscope to fulgurate bladder tumours.
One of Kidd’s major achievements, however, was the foundation, with Horace Winsbury-White, of the British Journal of Urology in March 1929. Kidd was fired with enthusiasm, he was a knowledgable and skilful surgeon, with a passion for urology and for the London Hospital.
In November 1931 his health failed again and he had to temporarily stop work. Frank Kidd died suddenly from coronary thrombosis on 12 May 1934, at the age of 56.
Books by Frank Kidd
Urinary Surgery: A Review
Written before Kidd had developed any significant surgical expertise
Further informaion on Amazon or Read the archived article
Common Diseases of the Urethra, Being a Course of Lectures Delivered at The London Hospital
The first of Kidd's textbooks on his specialist interest area of venereology
Further information on Amazon or Read the archived article
Common Disease of the Female Urethra and Cervix (with A Malcolm Simpson)
Kidd's second textbook on venereology
Further information on Amazon
Common Infections of the Kidneys, with the Colon Bacillus and Other Allied Bacteria
Further information on Amazon
Obituaries of Frank Kidd
British Medical Journal British Journal of Urology
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