Sisely, Lorna Verdun (1916 - 2004)

Summary

Lorna Sisely was only the second person in Australia to receive a fellowship for the Royal Australian College of Surgeons (FRACS). After starting a science degree at the University of Melbourne, she switched medicine in 1937 and won top awards throughout her studies. Sisely's first position was as a Resident at St Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne where she became assistant to the senior surgeon. In 1947 she moved to the Queen Victoria Hospital and also took up the post of Anatomy Demonstrator at the University of Melbourne where she completed her Master of Surgery there. Sisely was the first female to win the A. Gordon Craig Travelling Scholarship which she used to study female urology and surgery overseas. Upon returning to Australia she became Senior Surgeon at the Queen Victoria Hospital - a position she held for thirty four years - and in 1980 established the hospital's first breast clinic.

Details

Chronology

1942 - 1944

Career position - Junior Resident Medical Officer and Senior Resident Medical Officer at St Vincent's Hospital, Melbourne

1947 - 1949

Career position - Demonstrator in the Department of Anatomy and Pathology at the University of Melbourne

1947 - 1949

Career position - Honorary Assistant Surgeon at the Children's Hospital, Victoria

1947 - 1981

Career position - Surgeon Senior Staff at the Queen Victoria Medical Centre (previously the Queen Victoria Hospital), Victoria

1949

Award - Gordon Craig Scholarship in Surgery received

1962 -

Career position - Member of the American College of Surgeons

1964 - 1981

Career position - Member of the Anti-Cancer Council of Victoria

1979

Career position - Founder and Consultant Surgeon in the Breast Clinic at Monash Medical Centre, Victoria

1980

Award - Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE)

1980 - 1981

Career position - Dean of the Clinical School in the Queen Victoria Medical Centre at Monash University, Victoria

1981 -

Career position - Consultant Surgeon at the Monash Medical Centre, Victoria

Published resources

Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation Exhibitions

• McCarthy, Gavan; Morgan, Helen; Smith, Ailie; van den Bosch, Alan, Where are the Women in Australian Science?, Exhibition of the Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation, First published 2003 with lists updated regulary edn, Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre, Melbourne, Victoria, 2003, https://eoas.info/exhibitions/wisa/wisa.html. Details

Resources

• 'Sisely, Lorna Verdun (1916-2004)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-741075. Details

See also

• Herd, Margaret ed., Who's who in Australia 2002 (Melbourne: Crown Content, 2001), 2020 pp. Details