Past Presidents

My first happy duty as incoming President of the Liverpool Society of Anaesthetists is to welcome you to this Website and indeed, to this Society.  A less happy duty is to say that because of Covid- 19 restrictions, electronic communication is likely to have an enlarged role in the functioning of the Society. As I write, it is likely that our meetings this year will have to take  a hybrid, digital, at-distance form.

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I think it a great honour to be appointed President of the LSA. My predecessors number major figures in Anaesthesia, people who have shaped the profession and made huge contributions to the subject. I can make no such claims, but I can say that I am a Liverpool anaesthetist, and I am proud enough of that. I was born and raised in Liverpool, returned to the city to start my training in Anaesthesia in 1987 and essentially, have remained here since, taking up a post in theatre and PICU at Alder Hey in 1996.

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Looking back over my career, I am struck by how much of it has been serendipitous rather than as a result of meticulous planning on my part. There was good formal training but principally, there was the example of role models and their timely encouragement. Thus, it seems to me, I was nudged into a job which I continue to love.

What can I say to encourage you to engage with the LSA? How can I ask you to give up further time at the end of a working day?

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As one of my predecessors noted, the aims of the LSA are quite Reithian; to inform, educate and entertain (not necessarily in that order) and also, I think, to encourage.

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A career in Anaesthesia offers unparalleled opportunity for meeting both triumph and disaster. It will certainly provide enough moments when you must keep your head when all about are losing theirs and blaming it on you. It is then that you realise that responsibility is at the core of our profession, even (or is that especially) when it comes with all too little power.  At such times, an anaesthetist needs encouragement;  the LSA  cannot always provide poetry,  but its meetings  do frequently provide a little knowledge,  some nourishment, and always, a framework to allow us to support each other.

 

Frank Potter

 

A Brief Biography of Frank Potter

Francis Anthony Potter (born 6 April 1960) is consultant in paediatric anaesthesia and intensive care at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool.

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Career: He qualified in Medicine MB, ChB in 1983 from the University of Manchester. After house jobs in Stockport etc he entered anaesthesia in 1987 gaining FRCA. He was appointed as consultant in paediatric anaesthesia and intensive care at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, Liverpool in 1996.

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Medical Positions

1. Chair of Medical Board at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital

2. President of the Liverpool Society of Anaesthetists

 

Personal Life: He was born in Liverpool, the youngest of four children, and raised in the Norris Green area of the city. He attended St Edward’s College in West Derby. Frank married in 1986 and has two sons.

 

Interests: Frank’s many and varied interests spawned his enthusiasm for quizzes. His President’s Address to the Liverpool Society of Anaesthetists was on the History of Quizzing and, as well as being quiz master for the annual Alder Hey quiz, he has taken part in the BBC TV quiz Eggheads and BBC Radio 4’s Brain of Britain. In 2004, Frank was a contestant on BBC TV’s long-running quiz Mastermind, where, taking the Second World War as his specialist subject, he won his heat. In the semi-finals he took the History of Liverpool as his specialist subject and was denied a place in the final only on account of the number of “passes”, having tied on points scored. He was defeated by the eventual champion of the series, Shaun Wallace, who has since gone on to make a career as a professional “quizzer” and Chaser on ITV’s The Chase.

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