Dr Stephen McGowan

Formerly Consultant in General Adult Psychiatry, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust (Lambeth), UK

Stephen William McGowan, who died unexpectedly aged 45, was a consultant psychiatrist remembered by colleagues as a doctor willing to ‘go the extra mile’ in his job at the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust. He was dedicated to his work. A former trainee described how he ‘embodied the practice of active listening, giving meaning to patients’ experiences while retaining his inquisitive scientific stance’.

Stephen was a valued teacher and head of undergraduate psychiatry students. He was also clinical supervisor for the general practice and psychiatry trainees attached to the community team and ward in Lambeth, part of the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust. A former trainee remembered him as a ‘kind and generous teacher, a witty intellectual who was incisive and sensitive to the pressures that urban life placed upon us and our patients. He went out of his way to prepare me for what lay ahead in my chosen career’. The consultant in the neighbouring office described a great deal of laughter coming from Stephen's office during the weekly teaching sessions, indicative of how Stephen brought his own unique sense of humour to the proceedings.

After attending Newcastle High School, he gained a scholarship to Magdalen College, Oxford, for his preclinical studies. He received a distinction in prelims and an upper second in his final degree. In 1989, he won the Oxford University Department of Psychiatry essay prize. He qualified in medicine at Oxford in 1990. After house jobs in Winchester and Oxford, he joined the Oxford senior house officer scheme in psychiatry in 1992 and 3 years later gained his MRCPsych. His registrar training included a 6-month research registrar post with the Wellcome Trust in the Oxford University Department of Psychiatry.

In 1995, Stephen sustained an extension injury to his neck while on a skiing holiday and as a result suffered an embolic stroke shortly afterwards, having induced a tear in the lining of both internal carotid arteries. Fortunately, after treatment in a neuro-intensive care unit at Innsbruck Hospital, Austria he made a complete recovery.

He completed his psychiatry training by gaining an MRC Clinical Training Fellowship at the Cyclotron Unit at Hammersmith Hospital from 1997 to 2000. His research centred on positron emission tomography research of pre-synaptic dopaminergic function in medicated patients with schizophrenia, including medication-naive individuals and others with clinical evidence of prodromal symptoms.

From the Hammersmith Hospital, Stephen joined the specialist registrar scheme at the South London and Maudsley with posts in forensic psychiatry, the Maudsley Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit, the Norwood community team and liaison psychiatry at King's College Hospital.

He achieved an impressive list of publications in a variety of different journals as well as abstracts for international meetings.

Stephen was a dedicated psychiatrist with highly valued basic human qualities. Colleagues in Lambeth remember his kindness – his willingness to swap an on-call or give a second opinion about a patient, his generosity – contributing bottles of wine when the team socialised in the evening and the sense that he valued them. His friend Eu-Gene Cheah from Magdalen College, Oxford, now living in the Far East, remembers him fondly as ‘without doubt my best friend’. Stephen enjoyed foreign travel, good food and wine and the company of others; the rich and happy memories brought together by his untimely death are not a surprise.