Summary
Dr. Lloyd D. MacLean, long-time co-editor of the Canadian Journal of Surgery passed away earlier this year at the age of 90. In order to appreciate the contributions of Dr. MacLean to the journal, this commentary recognizes him as a humble surgeon–scientist who was one of — if not the — most outstanding Canadian ambassadors to academic surgery in North America.
In order to appreciate the contributions of Lloyd MacLean to the Canadian Journal of Surgery (CJS), it is obligatory to recognize a humble surgeon–scientist who was one of — if not the — most outstanding Canadian ambassadors to academic surgery in North America.
A native Calgarian, Dr. MacLean’s formative years occurred in Alberta during The Great Depression, the dust bowl and World War II. Those were hard times in the Prairies. “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” Dr. MacLean graduated from the post-war Faculty of Medicine of the University of Alberta in 1949. His next 12 years of training, research and academic clinical practice occurred at the University of Minnesota. He obtained his doctorate there through research in shock and sepsis, which became a career-long study. In 1962, Dr. MacLean returned to Canada, not the West but to Montreal, where he was recruited as surgeon-in-chief at the Royal Victoria Hospital, an office he held for 26 years. As professor of surgery at McGill University, Dr. MacLean served as chairman of the department for intervals between 1968 and 1988. In 1987 he was named the first Edward W. Archibald Professor in the Department of Surgery.
Leadership is recognized in numerous ways. Within the Royal Victoria Hospital and McGill University, Dr. MacLean established programs of clinical excellence and research in shock, sepsis, transplantation and bariatric surgery, which all gained international recognition. His trainees and colleagues from McGill were appointed university heads of surgery in Canada and the United States. In 1985 Dr. MacLean was appointed Officer of the Order of Canada, and in 1989 he received the Gairdner Wightman Award — both for outstanding contributions to Canadian medicine. In 1992 he was elected president of the prestigious American Surgical Association, and the following year he was appointed president of the American College of Surgeons. These offices have been held by few other Canadians. The Department of Surgery at McGill University has established the L. D. MacLean Visiting Professorship in General Surgery, and recently a second award in his name was created to honour lifetime contributions to the department by an individual.
During the more than 30 years of Dr. MacLean’s academic surgical career at McGill, one would not expect less than his acceptance of yet another responsibility to guide Canadian surgeons. In 1970 Fred Kergin of Toronto sought his successor as editor of CJS. By 1972 Barber Mueller of McMaster University and Dr. MacLean were appointed as the first coeditors of CJS — the only indexed Canadian surgery journal. It was owned and published by the Canadian Medical Association, which provided management and editorial support. The direction for the journal, the quality of its content, the communication with the readership and the continuity of scientific merit became the responsibility of the editors and their board. Drs. MacLean and Mueller sustained this role for an incredible 20 years. The common thread between these coeditors during their tenure was the voluntary contribution of time devoted to CJS despite massive work hours required to chair their respective university departments.
Dr. MacLean was responsible for sustaining the bilingual content of CJS, maintaining this vehicle as a means for the Royal College to communicate with Canadian surgeons and eliciting resident research contributions. He was responsible for continuing the “Quill on Scalpel” section, started by Fred Kergin, for publication of Canadian specialty society symposia and the publication of nationally invited presentations. Drs. MacLean and Mueller continuously endeavored to promote publication of Canadian surgical research. To accomplish this goal, both editors would personally pursue contributors from annual meetings, from special lectures, from symposia chairs and state of the art presentations. Dr. MacLean encouraged communication from readers through the “Correspondence” section. Their overall drive through 20 years of dedication to CJS was to sustain a publication that would stimulate knowledge, enlighten new directions in surgery and encourage contributions and communications from and for Canadian surgeons.
Unrelated to their planned resignation as coeditors, the CJS came upon financial constraint beginning in the 1990s. Increasing costs of publication, combined with loss of fiscal contributions from the Royal College and advertising revenue threatened the viability of CJS. As president and secretary, respectively, of the Canadian Association of General Surgeons at that time, Jean Couture and I presented a long-negotiated solution for sponsorship of the journal by selected surgical specialty societies. This formula was accepted and to this date has helped sustain Canada’s only indexed surgery journal. Continuous publication of CJS has enabled the readership to understand the incredible personal contributions of Lloyd MacLean and Barber Mueller from 1972 to 1992.
Footnotes
Competing interests: None declared.
- Accepted May 22, 2015.