Dr Timothy Griffiths

Dr Timothy Griffiths, known as Tim to patients and colleagues alike, died suddenly on the 29th June. Tim returned to Cardiff, his home town, in 1995 to take up the post of Senior Lecturer in Respiratory Medicine in the then University of Wales College of Medicine and Honorary Consultant Physician to the Llandough Hospital NHS Trust.

During undergraduate training in Cardiff Tim obtained a First in Physiology and completed medicine in the Welsh National School of Medicine 1981. After completion of pre-registration posts, Tim continued his postgraduate training in Newcastle Upon Tyne before undertaking his PhD work on adenosine receptors in the lung in Southampton. After a period as a lecturer at St Georges in London he returned to Cardiff. The early involvement with respiratory physiology shaped both his career and his perception of respiratory diseases and the approach to their treatment.

Dr Griffiths will be remembered by many patients and staff for his work developing pulmonary rehabilitation for patients with chronic respiratory diseases. In the development of this programme Tim showed his underlying sense of physiological science and blended that with more social and psychological aspects to produce an holistic programme, which he then set about proving worked in a randomised controlled trial. This approach to clinical research in this area and brought him a national and international reputation in the field of pulmonary rehabilitation. He also developed an out-reach service from the hospital to care for patients living Cardiff and recently discharged from hospital. Tim also made significant contributions to the development of the current medical undergraduate curriculum in Cardiff and his influence on both undergraduate and postgraduate training of doctors will be appreciated for many years.

Tim is survived by his wife Eileen and their three children and will be sadly missed by his large and supportive family as well as patients and colleagues who worked with him and knew him well.

Professor Dennis Shale, Department of Respiratory Medicine