John Jarrett
John Jarrett qualified in 1957, having studied at Cambridge University and King’s College
Hospital. An early house job in the Diabetic Department at King’s (founded by R D Lawrence,
the pioneer of diabetes treatment in Britain) aroused a life-long interest in
the subject and provided the first encounter with Harry Keen, then a research
registrar in the department. Subsequently, after two years in the pharmacology
department at Guy’s Hospital Medical School he joined the Department of Medicine,
headed by Professor John Butterfield, whose research interests were primarily centred on diabetes.
Indeed, in the previous year, the department had carried out a diabetes survey in
Bedford. 1963-4 was spent in Pittsburg, doing laboratory research with Dr James Field.
On returning to Guy’s he joined the follow-up of the Bedford Survey and a few years later participated in the Whitehall Survey, in a collaboration with the London School of Hygiene. These two studies, together with the Pima Indian research, provided the basis for the WHO criteria for type 2 diabetes published in 1980. They also established the association between glucose intolerance and cardiovascular disease.
Epidemiology proved to be a congenial form of research and resulted in a career change to ‘clinical epidemiology’ in the department of Community Medicine at Guy’s. The value of diabetes epidemiology was recognised by the joint WHO/IDF committee in 1980 and Harry Keen and John were commissioned to organise a seminar to provide training in epidemiology with special reference to diabetes. The first was held in St John’s College Cambridge in 1981; fortunately it proved to be successful and has persisted as a Cambridge event at least until 2006.