YOO o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2005-05-19 published
Robert FREEDOM,
Surgeon 1941-2005
The director of cardiology at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children
was a widely respected surgeon who wrote hefty textbooks and
played a key role in the royal commission that investigated the
mystery deaths of 36 baby patients
By Allison
LAWLOR,
Special to The Globe and Mail, Thursday, May
19, 2005, Page S11
Halifax -- Known by his peers as "Mr. Pediatric Cardiology,"
Robert FREEDOM was widely respected for his clinical skills and
for his training of cardiologists from around the world, and
as a prolific author of clinical research and textbooks, several
of which are considered classics in the field. Less happily,
he figured large in a sensational 1981 murder probe and a subsequent
royal commission that investigated the deaths of more than 30
babies at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children
It wasn't uncommon to find the head of cardiology at Sick Kids
hunched over his desk in the early morning hours writing. Over
his career, Dr.
FREEDOM wrote more than 400 medical papers, 125
book chapters, and eight textbooks, including the formidably
large Atlas of Congenital Heart Disease and the Natural and Modified
History of Congenital Heart Disease. Published in 2003, it was
the last of his textbooks.
Robert Mark
FREEDOM was a native of Maryland, where he and his
twin brother, Gary, experienced a disruptive childhood. Shortly
after they were born, their parents divorced and they had virtually
no contact with their father, a neurologist and an eighth-generation
physician. When they were still young, they moved to Southern
California and were soon placed together in boarding schools
and residential homes. The brothers remained close throughout
their lives.
Robert studied medicine at the University of California at Los
Angeles; Gary went on to earn a PhD in geography. Initially focused
on neurosurgery, Dr.
FREEDOM soon found a new interest. At medical
school, he was asked to perform four autopsies on babies or children
with congenital cardiac disease; from that experience, he decided
to pursue a new path in medicine.
After finishing medical school, he was accepted for an internship
and residency in pediatrics at Children's Hospital Boston. While
there, he also studied pediatric cardiology. In 1972, he was
recruited by Richard
ROWE, then director of pediatric cardiology
at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, to become the director
of the diagnostic cardiac catheterization laboratory and assistant
professor of pediatrics. When Dr.
ROWE, who had become his mentor,
was recruited to take over as director of cardiology at the Hospital
for Sick Children in 1973, he asked Dr.
FREEDOM to join him in
Toronto.
Dr. FREEDOM moved to Canada in the summer of 1974 and spent the
rest of his career there, dedicating himself to the hospital
and the faculty of medicine at the University of Toronto. But
the next decade did not unfold so smoothly, and there were times
when he must have questioned his choice of careers, or at least
hospitals.
On March 25, 1981, police accused Sick Kids nurse Susan
NELLES
of murdering baby Justin
COOK.
Two days later, she was charged
with murdering three other infants. More than a year later, in
May of 1982, Ms.
NELLES was discharged at a preliminary hearing.
A royal commission headed by Mr. Justice Samuel
GRANGE of the
Supreme Court of Ontario then examined the circumstances surrounding
Ms. NELLES's arrest and prosecution.
The commission also tried to reconstruct events at the hospital
from June 30, 1980, to March 22, 1981, to determine whether the
babies died of heart defects or were murdered by overdoses of
the heart drug digoxin. All told, the commission investigated
36 deaths.
In September of 1983, Dr.
FREEDOM testified before the commission
that he had told several of his relatives that "someone is killing
our babies" after he learned that large amounts of digoxin had
been found in a baby who died in March of 1981. Days later, he
repeated the comment to Metro Toronto Police Staff-Sergeant Anthony
WARR. He said he was convinced that something malevolent had
transpired at the hospital after three babies died with high
levels of the heart drug in their bodies.
"I believe I made the comment to my wife or my brother-in-law
and his wife late on the Saturday night [March 21] after I heard
of the digoxin readings on [infant] Allana
MILLER,"
Dr.
FREEDOM
said. "The digoxin levels in the baby had been low [in the afternoon]
and then they were sky-high. I thought something malicious was
going on."
Dr. FREEDOM testified that when he learned of the high readings
on the night of March 21, he thought, "My God, how can she go
from a very low level to a very high level?... I wonder if it's
murder?"
The commission also heard that he was so alarmed about the deaths
that he told another doctor during a catherization on Justin
COOK: "If this baby dies, we have a murderer on our hands."
Judge GRANGER later heard that Dr.
FREEDOM had provided a vital
link in the murder investigation when he told a homicide detective
that problems with an intravenous line could have resulted in
a digoxin overdose slowly infusing into the baby's body over
several hours, making it possible for Ms.
NELLES to have given
the drug to the infant before she went off duty on the evening
before the infant died.
At the preliminary hearing, Ms.
NELLES was cleared of all charges
after the judge found insufficient evidence to send the case
to trial.
In 1986, Dr.
FREEDOM succeeded his mentor as director of cardiology
at Sick Kids, a post he held until the fall of 2000, when he
stepped down because of failing health.
"We're one of the largest and best-known divisions of pediatric
cardiology in the world," said Lee
BENSON, a long-time colleague.
A big burly man, Dr.
FREEDOM demanded high standards not only
from himself but from everyone around him, and he could be intimidating.
During his teaching rounds, medical students were known to tremble
with fright. But, as a professor, he won his fair share of awards.
He also helped in developing a three-year, sub-specialty training
program in pediatric cardiology at the Royal College of Physicians
and Surgeons.
Dr. FREEDOM was known among colleagues for his encyclopedic memory.
If another doctor so much as mentioned a study in an obscure
publication, he was able to recall not only details but authors
and publication date, said his friend and colleague Shi-Joon
YOO.
His patients loved him. "The parents worshipped the ground he
walked on," said Dr.
BENSON, adding that years later he remembered
their names. Obsessive about his work, he spent all hours of
the day and night in the hospital. "He lived at Sick Kids," said
his wife, Penny, whom he met in the late 1980s after a couple
of failed marriages.
Despite suffering from diabetes, Dr.
FREEDOM didn't take care
of his own health. He enjoyed Scotch, smoking cigars and eating
whatever he desired. "Bob did things his way," Dr.
BENSON said.
Not one to usually take vacations, he changed his mind after
a trip to Granville Ferry in Nova Scotia's Annapolis Valley.
Located on the Annapolis River, he fell in love with the place
and would spend a month there each year until he retired.
Dr. FREEDOM received several awards, including the Council Award
of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, presented
to Ontario physicians who are judged to have been closest to
meeting society's vision of an "ideal" physician. In 2000, he
was named to the Order of Ontario.
Robert FREEDOM was born on February 27, 1941, in Baltimore. He
died on May 7, 2005, in Halifax of renal failure as a result
of diabetes. He was 64. He leaves his wife Penny and stepson
Jonathan.
Y... Names YO... Names YOO... Names Welcome Home
YOOL o@ca.on.grey_county.artemesia.flesherton.the_flesherton_advance 2005-06-08 published
YOOL,
Cecil and Florence
In memory of a dear father, grandfather and great-grandfather,
Cecil, who passed away June 10, 1987, and a dear mother, grandmother
and great-grandmother; Florence, who passed away August 23, 1998.
They had a sense of humour
And a sparkle in their eye,
A helping hand in times of need,
On that we could rely.
Maybe we can't touch their hands,
Or see their smiling face.
Maybe we can't hear their voice
Or feel their warm embrace
But something we will always have
Tucked safely in our hearts
Our love for them, their love for us,
Will never let us part
Forever▼ loved and never forgotten, Al and Edna
YOOL and Family.
Page 3
Y... Names YO... Names YOO... Names Welcome Home
YOOL o@ca.on.grey_county.artemesia.flesherton.the_flesherton_advance 2005-06-15 published
McKECHNIE,
Cecil and Florence
In memory of a dear father, grandfather and great-grandfather,
Cecil who passed away June 10, 1987 and a dear mother, grandmother
and great-grandmother Florence who passed away August 23, 1998.
They had a sense of humour
And a sparkle in their eye.
A helping hand in times of need,
On that we could rely.
Maybe we can't touch their hands,
Or see their smiling face.
Maybe we can't hear their voice,
Or feel their warm embrace.
But something we will always have,
Tucked safely in our hearts,
Our love for them, their love for us,
Will never let us part
Forever▲ loved and never forgotten, Al and Edna
YOOL and Family.
Page 3
Y... Names YO... Names YOO... Names Welcome Home
YOOL o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.toronto_star 2005-12-19 published
YOOL,
Ethel
May
(WELWOOD)
At Headwaters Health Care Centre, Orangeville, on Sunday, December
18, 2005, Ethel May
WELWOOD, in her 88th year, beloved wife of
the late Garfield
YOOL,
Orangeville. Dear mother of Dennis and
Crystal YOOL,
Bellvue,
Washington, U.S.A.; Doug and Karen
YOOL,
Georgetown. Loving grandmother of Laura and Robert; Sarah and
Matthew O'ROURKE,
James and Jessica. Dear sister of Irene and
Paul BLAND,
Edith and Eddie
NURSE, Arthur (deceased) and Verda
WELWOOD,
Frank (deceased) and Margaret
WELWOOD. The family will
receive their Friends at the Egan Funeral Home Baxter and Giles
Chapel, 273 Broadway, Orangeville (519-941-2630) Monday evening
7-9 o'clock. Funeral service will be held in the chapel on Tuesday,
December 20 at 2 o'clock. Interment Forest Lawn Cemetery. If
desired, memorial donations may be made to the Heart and Stroke
Foundation of Ontario, Dufferin Chapter, 204-21 Surrey Street
W., Guelph N1H 3R3 or The Gideon Memorial Bible Plan, P.O. Box
3619, 501 Imperial Road N., Guelph N1H 7A2. Condolences for the
family may be offered at www.eganfuneralhome.com
Y... Names YO... Names YOO... Names Welcome Home
YOOL - All Categories in OGSPI