Dorothy Cooper: 30 June 1915–29 December 2008

Dr Dorothy J Cooper was born on 30th June 1915 on Highgate Hill to a London business family. She grew up with the knowledgeable and effective use of homeopathy in her home and, by the age of 14, had decided to go into medicine.

In 1934, she passed her First MB at Croydon High School and obtained a place at the London School of Medicine for Women. She did most of her training and early house jobs there and at the Royal Free Hospital, qualifying MRCS, LRCP in 1939.

At the outbreak of war, she was recalled from holiday to take up a house job at the Royal Free and worked there through the blitz. She never forgot seeing the tough London firemen in A&E with tears streaming down their smoke-grimed faces, not because of their injuries, but because the tide was out and they did not have enough water to prevent London burning. Dr Cooper then took a house surgeon post at the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital and was there through that blitz. Later she worked for 2 years in Public Health as a Schools' Medical Officer ‘to get some nights in bed’.

Towards the latter part of the war, she was called up and joined the RAMC, being posted to a military hospital in Bangor, Northern Ireland, where she became Medical Commanding Officer with a rank of Major, acting Lieutenant-Colonel. She was demobilised in 1947 and returned to London for further study, working at Great Ormond Street Hospital and gaining her DCH.

In 1948, she moved to Bath to care for elderly relatives, and entered General Practice with the inception of the NHS. She found an increasing need for homeopathy and used and studied it, frequently attending Faculty meetings and lectures in London, being taught by, amongst others, Sir John Weir, Dr Lees Templeton, Dr Hamish Boyd and Dr Elizabeth Wright-Hubbard.

In 1954, she was asked to take over the Bath Homeopathic Clinic, a charity endowed in 1849. For many years she saw upwards of 20 patients in each of three sessions a week. With the need and demand for homeopathic treatment increasing and the time for prescribing and study limited, she resigned from the NHS in 1964 and became a private consultant homeopathic physician recognised by the Provident Associations. Dr Cooper always encouraged patients to use ‘home remedies’ and, in later years, took great pains to teach them when and how to use these.

She was very interested in and undertook much study of the nosodes. Dr Foubister's work on the Carcinosins and later Folliculinum fascinated her and she studied and discussed these with him. The paper she submitted for her Faculty Fellowship in 1988 contained results and statistics from over 20 years of study and clinical experience. She wrote a number of excellent papers for the British Homeopathic Journal.

Dr Cooper was, for many years, an important and much valued member of the postgraduate teaching programme in Bristol and her detailed lectures were enjoyed by many colleagues. For decades, she maintained a lone but stalwart voice for homeopathy in Bath in what were, at times, difficult circumstances. She had a robust Christian faith and played an important role in providing medical care for many missionaries serving overseas. Her singular contribution will long be remembered.