In this issue of O&G Magazine, we look back at one of Australia’s pioneering women in medicine – the remarkable and inspirational, Dr Lorna Lloyd-Green.

Born in Melbourne in 1910, Lloyd-Green was a talented and dedicated student. She attended Lowther Hall, where she was dux and school captain in 1929. In 1933, she graduated from the University of Melbourne with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery. Soon after, she became one of the first female obstetricians and gynaecologists in Melbourne, undertaking residencies at three different hospitals before being appointed Medical Superintendent at the Queen Victoria Memorial Hospital in 1939.

Lloyd-Green’s extraordinary work ethic and devotion to duty, evident since her school days, was to be called upon to full effect during this period of her career. While working at the Queen Victoria Memorial Hospital during World War II, she was on call 24 hours a day for two years. Her dedication was such that she famously “never missed a delivery.”¹ Flesch and McPhee note that her dedication “led her to spend every night of World War II at the Queen Victoria Hospital, on occasions snatching only a few hours’ sleep between births.”²

Figure 1. Title page of Charles Estienne’s La dissection des parties du corps humain diuisee en trois liures, 1546. (RANZCOG Frank Forster Library collection)

This was only part of what made Lloyd-Green extraordinary. Alongside her medical abilities, she was a fierce advocate for the rights of women in the medical field, pushing for equal pay for equal work as well as advocating for increased training opportunities for medical women to enable them to acquire the skills they needed to take up senior positions.³ She founded the sterility clinic at the Queen Victoria Hospital and ran it for 25 years, a program “which became the infertility clinic and later the IVF Clinic at Queen Victoria Monash.”⁴ Over the course of her career, Lloyd-Green received numerous honours. She was awarded an Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1968 and a Commander of the Order of British Empire (CBE) in 1979. She was also the first woman to be made a Fellow of the Australian Medical Association in 1969, and was named “Woman of the Year” in 1970.¹

Lorna Lloyd-Green retired from medicine in 1983, but did not retire from the duty she felt she had to help and care for others. A talented musician who had once considered a career as a music teacher, Lloyd-Green retrained as a music therapist, and from 1989, worked in this role at Bethlehem Hospital, helping to care for patients in palliative care. For Lloyd-Green, it was an immensely rewarding and fulfilling role. As she put it, “the power and scope of music are tremendous, and it crosses all barriers of race, colour, creed, and language, and it is a great communicator. It can relieve anxiety and depression as well as pain and can add much to the happiness of the terminally ill patient.”⁵

A passionate advocate for both palliative care and music therapy, Lloyd-Green once described them as “two bright stars in the galaxy of the medical firmament”, which have “a great impact on acute medicine as a philosophy of care when cure is no longer possible.”⁵

RANZCOG is fortunate to be the recipient of several artefacts donated by Lorna Lloyd-Green. These include the case book submitted to the College for her admission as a Foundation Fellow of RANZCOG in 1947, as well as a range of medical equipment including a stethoscope, sphygmomanometers, a set of Neville-Barnes obstetric forceps, and various other instruments.

From a gynaecological perspective, perhaps the most historically significant item in this collection is a tubal insufflator used by Lorna Lloyd-Green. Invented in 1919 by American gynaecologist, Dr Isidor Clinton Rubin (1883-1958), this device formed “a standard part of infertility investigations for many years,” until it was “gradually replaced by an X-ray technique involving radio-opaque ‘dye’.⁶ It was used to detect blockages in the fallopian tubes, and operated by blowing “carbon dioxide, via a cannula, into the uterus.”⁶ A pressure gauge on the device, called a manometer, recorded the ease with which gas was able to escape the fallopian tubes, which in turn indicated the presence of any potential blockages.

Fig. 2. A selection of objects donated to the College by Lorna Lloyd-Green.

Fig. 3. Tubal insufflator donated by Lorna Lloyd-Green, c. 1919-1930s.

The exact date of this model is unknown, but ranges from between 1919 and the 1930s. It provides a fascinating historical insight into gynaecological practice.

Dr Lorna Lloyd-Green remains an inspirational figure in Australian medicine. A pioneer for women in medicine, an exceptional medical practitioner (and late in life, musical therapist) whose dedication to duty and a sense of care for others was truly remarkable. It is a privilege for the College to be able to play a small part in preserving her story through our historical collections.

A selection of items relating to Lorna Lloyd-Green are currently on display at Djeembana College Place in Naarm Melbourne. Members and trainees are invited to visit the College to view these fascinating artefacts from the history of obstetrics and gynaecology.