In 1968, when Ann Barrett qualified in medicine, the fast-changing specialty of oncology was a magnet for young doctors as new drugs and technology were beginning to nudge up survival rates. In her distinguished 40-year oncology career, Barrett, who has died aged 83, played a key part in improving cancer outcomes, particularly for children, becoming a world authority on paediatric radiotherapy.
As chair of radiation oncology first at the University of Glasgow and then at the University of East Anglia, she was highly influential in the profession with more than 150 published academic papers. She had a significant impact on student education and was a leading contributor to several textbooks that are still “go-to” classics, including Practical Radiotherapy Planning (1985, now in its fifth edition, 2023), and Cancer in Children: Clinical Management (1975, now in its seventh edition, as the Oxford Textbook of Cancer in Children, 2020).
After training at St Bartholomew’s hospital in London and various junior doctor posts, in 1977 Barrett became a consultant at the Royal Marsden hospital, a world leader in cancer research; Barrett specialised in brain tumours in children and in irradiating the central nervous system (the brain and spine).
In some cancers such as leukaemia, cancer cells are present in the whole body and those in the nervous system are particularly difficult to destroy. Determining the dose and precise location for the radiation was incredibly exacting work in an era before computers and scanners. Barrett had to liaise with physicists and others to precisely plan radiation for each child, bearing in mind that their organs were still developing, so caution was vital.
Barrett was convinced it was essential to pool knowledge with colleagues and regularly attended meetings with other paediatricians at the Royal Marsden. She also co-founded the UK Children’s Cancer Study Group (now the Children and Young People’s Cancer Association) in 1977, which had regular meetings in Birmingham to collect data on cancers and to advance understanding.
Although radiotherapy was widely given to patients throughout the UK, it was not yet established as an academic discipline in some medical schools. In 1980 the University of Glasgow set up a new department of radiation oncology, inviting Barrett in 1986 to become its first professor. There she set up the UK’s first MSc course in clinical oncology, devising the syllabus and teaching students. She was an early adopter of ideas such as holistic treatment of patients and the value of multidisciplinary collaboration.
Barrett thought that a patient’s surroundings, including gardens, could be highly therapeutic
In 1988 she helped set up the Beatson Oncology Centre, and became its director. It was the largest cancer treatment centre in Scotland, serving a population of 2.8 million, and it was one of the first in the UK to have multidisciplinary meetings, where cancer surgeons and oncologists met to agree treatment for each patient. Barrett also instigated annual conventions in St Andrews every spring for junior doctors and other professionals to learn about developments in oncology.
Taking a strong interest in holistic care, she helped set up the Maggie’s Centre in Glasgow, as a director from 1997 to 2001; it opened in 2002, six years after the first centre launched in Edinburgh. In particular, she felt that a patient’s surroundings, including any gardens, could be highly therapeutic.
The 1990s saw advances such as three-dimensional radiotherapy planning improving the accuracy of treatment, but the Beatson centre’s equipment was ageing and there simply was not enough of it. The centre should have had 11 linear accelerators (the machine that delivers radiotherapy) to serve its population, but it had only six. There were also not enough beds, so patients were frequently treated in corridors.
Deeply troubled, Barrett resigned in 2001, telling the British Medical Journal: “I am so unhappy that the quality of care I am able to give is so far below what I want that I simply find myself unable to carry on.” She was one of several consultants who left the Beatson centre, precipitating a government review and a major upgrade.
But Glasgow’s loss was Norwich’s gain: the University of East Anglia (UEA) had a brand-new medical school and in 2002 Barrett became its deputy dean and first professor of oncology.
It was an opportunity to influence the curriculum for the better. According to her boss, Sam Leinster, now professor emeritus at UEA, “Norwich medical school was a bit off the wall in that students went on to the wards from the first year. Ann was a prime mover in that and the communications skills course we ran. Students were on this course for a whole five years and Ann was a hands-on tutor.” She stayed at UEA until she retired in 2008.
Barrett was made OBE for services to healthcare in 2010
Aside from her university work, Barrett was dean of the Royal College of Radiologists from 2002 to 2004 and advised government and international bodies including the Ministry of Defence and Nato on the effects of radiation. In 2010 she was made OBE for services to healthcare.
Ann was born in Southgate, north London. Raised in the mining Welsh valleys, her father, Robert Brown, had moved to London to become a journalist, and her mother, Elsie (nee Warner), was a primary school teacher. Both were principled socialists. Ann was the eldest of three, with a brother, David, and sister, Jenny.
She attended Queen Elizabeth girls’ school in Barnet, north London, where she specialised in languages for A-level. When she decided to study medicine, having no science A-levels could have been a stumbling block, but fortunately St Bartholomew’s hospital accepted her, provided she did an extra pre-med year to get up to speed in biology.
Writing and editing were an important part of Barrett’s life, and she became secretary to the Society of Medical Writers. As well as her own scientific papers and textbooks, in 1976 she translated the paediatric oncologist Odile Schweisguth’s textbook from French into English, and in 1994 she took a media fellowship from the British Science Association to spend time working on the science desk of the Independent newspaper.
In retirement Barrett moved to Cambridge, where she was church warden at St Paul’s church, helping with the food bank and reaching out to marginalised people. She enjoyed nature and poetry as well as playing the piano, cycling round Cambridge, and visiting music and arts festivals. In 1970, she married John Barrett, a haematologist: they divorced 12 years later.
In 1989 she married Adrian Bell, a prison officer from Glasgow, having first met him when she cared for his wife, who had cancer. They also divorced, but she kept in close touch with her three stepchildren. She is survived by her brother, sister and stepchildren.
Ann Barrett, oncologist and writer, born 27 February 1943; died 18 March 2026
