Austin Bradford Hill (July 8, 1897 - April 18, 1991), English epidemiologist and statistician, pioneered the randomized clinical trial and, together with Richard Doll, was the first to demonstrate the connection between cigarette smoking and lung cancer. July 8 is the 189th day of the year (190th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 176 days remaining. ... 1897 (MDCCCXCVII) was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... April 18 is the 108th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (109th in leap years). ... 1991 (MCMXCI in Roman) is a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Royal motto (French): Dieu et mon droit (Translated: God and my right) Englands location within the British Isles Official language English de facto Capital London de facto Largest city London Area – Total Ranked 1st UK 130,395 km² Population – Total (mid-2004) – Total (2001 Census) – Density Ranked 1st UK... Epidemiology (Greek epi = upon, among; demos = people, district; logos = word, discourse), defined literally, is the study of epidemics in humans. ... For Wikipedia statistics, see m:Statistics Statistics is the science and practice of developing human knowledge through the use of empirical data expressed in quantitative form. ... In medicine, a clinical trial (synonyms: clinical studies, research protocols, medical research) is a research study. ... Sir Richard Doll Professor Sir William Richard Shaboe Doll, KBE CH FRS (28 October 1912–24 July 2005) was a British epidemiologist, physiologist, and a pioneer in the research linking smoking to health problems, being the first in the world to prove that smoking caused lung cancer, and increased the... A cigarette will burn to ash on one end. ... Lung cancer is a malignant tumour of the lungs. ...

Austin Bradford Hill, son of Sir Leonard Erskine Hill FRS a distinguished physiologist, was born in London and educated at Chigwell School, Essex. He served as a pilot in the First World War but was invalided out when he contracted tuberculosis. Two years in hospital and two years of convalescence put a medical qualification out of the question and he took a degree in economics by correspondence. In 1922 he went to work for the Industry Fatigue Research Board. He was associated with the medical statistician Major Greenwood and, to improve his statistical knowledge, Hill attended lectures by Karl Pearson. When Greenwood accepted a chair at the newly formed London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Hill moved with him, becoming Reader in Epidemiology and Vital Statistics in 1933 and Professor of Medical Statistics in 1947. The Fellowship of the Royal Society is composed of 1292 of the most distinguished scientists from the United Kingdom, other Commonwealth countries and the Republic of Ireland. ... The Houses of Parliament and the clock tower containing Big Ben Part of the London skyline viewed from the South Bank London is the capital city of England and the United Kingdom. ... Chigwell School is an English public school in the Epping Forest district of Essex. ... Essex is a county in the East of England. ... Ypres, 1917, in the vicinity of the Battle of Passchendaele. ... Tuberculosis (commonly shortened to TB) is an infection caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis, which most commonly effects the lungs (pulmonary TB) but can also effect the central nervous system (meningitis), lymphatic system, circulatory system (Miliary tuberculosis), genitourinary system, bones and joints. ... Economics (from the Greek οίκος [oikos], house, and νομος [nomos], rule, hence household management) is a social science that studies the production, distribution, trade and consumption of goods and services. ... 1922 (MCMXXII) was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... Major Greenwood (August 9, 1880 - October 5, 1949) English epidemiologist and statistician. ... Karl Pearson (pencil sketch in notebook; there is some see-through of writing on next page) Karl Pearson (March 27, 1857 – April 27, 1936) was a major contributor to the early development of statistics as a serious scientific discipline in its own right. ... Categories: Stub | University of London | Schools of Medicine | Health in London ... 1947 (MCMXLVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will take you to calendar). ...

Hill had a distinguished career in research and teaching and as author of a very successful textbook, Principles of Medical Statistics, but he is famous for two landmark studies. He was the statistician on the Medical Research Council Streptomycin in Tuberculosis Trials Committee and their study evaluating the use of streptomycin in treating tuberculosis, is generally accepted as the first randomised clinical trial. The use of randomisation in agricultural experiments had been pioneered by Ronald Aylmer Fisher. The second study was rather a series of studies with Richard Doll on smoking and lung cancer. The first paper, published in 1950, was a case-control study comparing lung cancer patients with matched controls. Doll and Hill also started a long-term prospective study of smoking and health. This was an investigation of the smoking habits and health of over 30,000 British doctors for several years (British doctors study). Fisher was in profound disagreement with the conclusions and procedures of the smoking/cancer work and from 1957 he criticised the work in the press and in academic publications. Sir Ronald Fisher Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher, FRS (February 17, 1890–July 29, 1962) was an extraordinarily talented evolutionary biologist, geneticist and statistician. ... 1950 (MCML in Roman) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ... Case-control studies are one type of epidemiological study design. ... A Study design is a way to set up an epidemiological investigation, as a form of clinical trial. ... The British doctors study is the generally accepted name of a prospective clinical trial which has been running from 1951 to 2001, and in 1956 provided convincing statistical proof that tobacco smoking increased the risk of lung cancer. ...

Hill was made a fellow of the Royal Society in 1954. Fisher was actually one of the proposers. The certificate of election read The premises of the Royal Society in London. ...

Has, by the application of statistical methods, made valuable contributions to our knowledge of the incidence and aetiology of industrial diseases, of the effects of internal migration upon mortality rates, and of the natural and experimental epidemiology of various infections, for example of the risks of an attack of poliomyelitis following inoculation procedures and of the risk of congenital abnormalities being precipitated by maternal rubella in the pregnant woman. Since the war he has demonstrated in an exact and controlled field survey the association between cigarette smoking and the incidence of cancer of the lung, and has been the leader in the development in medicine of the precise experimental methods now used nationally and internationally in the evaluation of new therapeutic and prophylactic agents. Poliomyelitis (polio), or infantile paralysis, is a viral paralytic disease. ... This page is a candidate to be moved to Wiktionary. ...

On Hill's death Peter Armitage wrote, "to anyone involved in medical statistics, epidemiology or public health, Bradford Hill was quite simply the world’s leading medical statistician." Peter Armitage born (July 15, 1924 is a statistician specialising in medical statistics. ... Epidemiology is the scientific study of factors affecting the health and illness of individuals and populations, and serves as the foundation and logic of interventions made in the interest of public health and preventive medicine. ...

Bibliography

Note that Austin Bradford Hill's surname was Hill and he always used the name Hill, AB in publications. However, he is often referred to as Bradford Hill. To add to the confusion, his friends called him Tony!

• "Principles of Medical Statistics (1937) London: The Lancet, 1937.
• "Medical Research Council (1948) Streptomycin in Tuberculosis Trials Committee. Streptomycin treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. British Medical Journal, 2: 769-83.
• "Doll R, Hill AB. (1950) Smoking and carcinoma of the lung. Preliminary report, British Medical Journal, 2: 739-748.
• "Doll R, Hill AB. (1954) The mortality of doctors in relation to their smoking habits. British Medical Journal, 228:1451-5.

The Lancet is one of the oldest and most respected peer-reviewed medical journals, published weekly by the Lancet Publishing Group, part of Reed Elsevier. ... The British Medical Journal (BMJ) is a medical journal published weekly in the United Kingdom by the British Medical Association (BMA)which published its first issue in 1845. ... The British Medical Journal (BMJ) is a medical journal published weekly in the United Kingdom by the British Medical Association (BMA)which published its first issue in 1845. ... The British Medical Journal (BMJ) is a medical journal published weekly in the United Kingdom by the British Medical Association (BMA)which published its first issue in 1845. ...

Discussion

• "Richard Doll (1994) Austin Bradford Hill, Biographical Memoirs of fellows of the Royal Society, 40, 129-140.
• "Peter Armitage (1991) Obituary: Sir Austin Bradford Hill 1897-1991, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series A (Statistics in Society), 154, 482-484.
• A. Yoshioka Use of randomisation in the Medical Research Council's clinical trial of streptomycin in pulmonary tuberculosis in the 1940s, British Medical Journal,317:1220-1223 ( 31 October 1998) extract
• P. Armitage, W. Bodmer, I. Chalmers, R. Doll, H. Marks contribute to a Symposium on Bradford Hill and Fisher International Journal of Epidemiology, 32, (6), (2003), 922-948.

External links

Hill's well-known paper on causation is available on the web

• "The Environment and Disease: Association or Causation?," Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, 58 (1965), 295-300.

Doll has some comments on his teacher and boss in

• Interview with Richard Doll

This article has a photograph of Hill. There is another at

• Sir Austin Bradford Hill on the Portraits of Statisticians page.

and another at

• Sir (Austin) Bradford ('Tony') Hill at the National Portrait Gallery

The Royal Society information comes from their website

• Royal Society