Dr Peter Cole

Peter Cole was President of SAAD from 1983 to 1985. He died in April of this year at the age of 98. He was one of a group of eminent medical anaesthetists, including Tom Bolton and Sir Robert Macintosh, who supported SAAD at a time when many hospital anaesthetists were very unsupportive of the Society. At the time Peter was a senior Consultant Anaesthetist at Bart’s.

In the 1980s SAAD was the Society for the Advancement of Anaesthesia in Dentistry and practised exactly that; a very different society to that which exists today. It was customary to alternate the presidency between medical and dental practitioners, however, Peter was not simply a figurehead. He was a regular lecturer on the main courses and a member of the team who delivered the very successful LifeSaver programme. This was the brainchild of Peter Hunter. By the time the series concluded, over 8,000 UK dentists and nurses had attended a course and Peter Cole was a member of the team which took the course to the United Arab Emirates and to Australia!

SAAD is now a highly regarded group and a very successful business delivering excellent teaching in sedation techniques for dentistry. There have been great changes over the last 40 years but without the support and courage of Peter Cole and his like we would not be here today.

Ian Brett