Paul Beeson (1908–2006), Distinguished Physician

Abstract

Paul Bruce Beeson (1908–2006) was a preeminent academic physician in both the United States and Great Britain. He attended medical school at McGill University in Canada and then trained at the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard University. During his career, he was Chairman of the Departments of Medicine at Emory University and at Yale University and then became Nuffield Professor at Oxford University. He ended his career at the Veterans Administration in Seattle as a Distinguished Physician. He was a skilled administrator and an excellent and admired clinician. He was also a productive scientist, who discovered interleukin-1, studied the pathogenesis of urinary tract infections and endocarditis, and delineated the causes of prolonged fever of unknown origin.