If I was to do this in chronological sense I think I would start with Thomas Sydenham, an English physician who’s life spanned the last year of the 1600s and half the 1700s.

I did at one stage give some talks on medical history, it’s an absorbing subject and Thomas was a man I liked to read about. He was clearly a clever man but he had a no-nonsense way of expressing himself. “A town derives more benefit from the arrival of a good clown than a cart load of physic”.

He is credited with a sort of blueprint for modern medicine, traditionally the bedrock is history and examination.

In particular Thomas explained the concept of the physical sign - now I suspect much neglected. Let me explain. If you have a pain in your belly that is a symptom. If that same belly is examined, the doctor may detect a swelling - that is a physical sign or just ‘sign’ for short.

It should be a vital step as it requires close examination of all the body systems which can tell you so very much, as well as being a direct link between doctor and patient. It is a step to seeing, as used to be said……”the whole patient and not just the hole in the patient!”

This seems to be a time when “all you need is data”, as provided by blood tests and scans and other things. Although there are reasons and circumstances why this has come about, but nonetheless to me and many others I think, that is a great worry!

Another great influence is someone I had barely heard about year or two ago, but have read so much about in books and articles. That what is more there is a local connection as Sir Albert Howard was born in Bishops Castle, Shropshire In 1873.

The causes he espoused might have seemed ‘wacky ‘even in the 1960s or 70s let alone the 1920s, but this man was no wooly-minded hippy! In fact he was an academic botanist and he worked in the Indian civil service before independence. 

He was one of the first people (in modern times) to describe the connection between soil, plants and human health . He recognised that the Indian population, predominantly poor farmers had much better health than their English, wealthy neighbours.  It can hardly have made him popular with his fellow-countrymen!                                                                                                     He recognised that the Indian composting and organic techniques we're leading to healthy vibrant and pest free crops, which could not be said of the western estates, who even at this time using copious amounts of artificial chemicals.

He was one of those very remarkable individuals who go against a whole stream of conventional thinking and he expressed this  with great bravery.

He's credited with a huge number of memorable quotations. Here are a couple.

“Artificial manures lead inevitably to artificial nutrition, artificial food, artificial animals and finally to artificial men and women.”

“Fertility of the soil is the future of civilisation.”

My wife Sue is a graduate of the Royal College of Music and taught music for many years. She tells me that her best ever musical experiences were sitting on the floor in primary school singing songs round the piano, which I found interesting! Here is my equivalent - when I was a medical student in the ‘pre-clinical’ years we had long summer holidays and I spent one working as a ward orderly in an Orthopaedic hospital. I thought I might learn something! I suppose I did pick up some orthopaedics but what I remember most are the two jolly ward cleaners that used to sweep into the ward every morning and talked to everybody and make the patients laugh. No doubt the surgeons and nurses were skilled and did a wonderful job but looking back those two ladies had the most advanced therapeutics!!

I need to include a couple of medical influences and the first would be Eric Baker-Bates, a highly eccentric and charismatic physician who taught me many things as an undergraduate in Liverpool. The one thing I come back to again and again is that if you sit long enough with someone they will tell what is wrong with them, and if you sit a bit longer they will probably tell you what to do about it!

My first job was a as ‘house surgeon’ as we said in those days, to Bill Sewell at the City General Hospital in Newcastle Staffordshire. A kindlier or wiser man I have never met, and a good surgeon as well. Part of the job was to admit patients for operation from out-patients and this we were keen to do especially if there was likely to be a good slice of action for us! Before the day of their operation Bill would sit on the bed of the patient and ask them “now……………do you really want this operation?” Half the time the answer would come back “well no, but I saw this young doctor in the outpatients and he said……………” “If I were you I would pack your bags and go home!” but he always patiently explained why!

Future influences to be mentioned are…………………. Zac Bush, Rupert Sheldrake and Anne Bickle, among others.

I am going to start with Rupert Sheldrake. I think I have been half aware of the name for a long time but in the background. The other year I read a wonderful book by his son Merlin… Entangled Life, Merlin being a mycologist a man of mushrooms, so I thought I better look at the work of the father. I have come to wish I did so many years ago. He is a wonderful writer and communicator whose mind ranges over many fascinating subjects. He is a distinguished biologist whose views and interests are anything but conventionally aligned with modern mainstream science which he sees as narrow, ‘reductionist’ (reduced to a smaller and smaller focus), materialist and characteristically serving the wrong master (my interpretation). He looks at simple human experience often entirely overlooked and applies what seems like a blistering energy to it’s investigation. The result is to my mind an explosion taking ud to new and highly applicable ideas. Don’t take my word for it you can start your own investigation on sheldrake.org. For many people this will be the start of a very long journey.

Zac Bush. The first time I listen to Zac………………was an accident I clicked the wrong button whilst attending online The Oxford Real Farming Conference. I was rooted to my seat from the word go. I could hardly believe it……………here was an American doctor saying all the things I had only come to realise very slowly and painfully and saying it with such confidence and eloquence - I admit I was greatly overcome. I am still a great follower of his work he is extraordinary in his capacity to encompass and aspects of humanity and do it with such vigour. He is also very entrepreneurial - which sometimes seem to muddy the waters but I think you have to realise he is trying to do a rate thing produce science which is independent - there is so little of it around and it is expensive.

Jenny Goodman. We heard Jenny Goodman at Groundswell, (please see Courses and meeting section). At once I thought this was an important and distinctive voice who was saying something very important. You can find her talk on ‘Utube’ - Groundswell24. She pulls no punches - she is a firebrand as she reveals the huge spectrum of attacks that exist on the human body (and by extension on the natural world). She is not afraid to point the finger.

I have just finished her book - Living in Toxic Times - it is extraordinary and truly horrifying, though she is positive about what we can do, where we can do it, and what is impossible to avoid. I suppose we need to realistically know the real scale depth and breadth of the problem before we can see any opening in the darkness.

Her interesting form of medicine (she is a doctor but will have not gained her specific knowledge, mainstream medicine) is ecological medicine a small but growing influence I suspect.

Andrew Weil. A great leader of the ‘Integrative Medicine’ movement in the USA but his writings and videos etc are extremely coherent and convincing.