Pioneer Cardiologist. Thomas Lewis was a British Cardiologist, who expanded the use of 1924 Nobel Prize recipient Willem Einthoven’s electrocardiogram. The two men had a very respectful professional relationship that grew into a close personal relationship. Sir Thomas Lewis was also nominated for a Nobel Prize with Einthoven along with being nominated six other times later, but never received the coveted award. Lewis established the lead placement on the chest to obtain an excellent EKG reading. He is regarded as the “father of clinical cardiac electrophysiology.” In the first half of the 20th century, he was one of the most respected cardiologists in Great Britain. Born the third of five children to a mining engineer, he was homeschooled by his mother with a tutor before classes at Clifton College. At the age of 16, he entered University College at Cardiff in Wales. An outstanding student, he published a paper on the spleen and lymph nodes before graduating, was student demonstrator in the anatomy and physiology laboratory, received the University Medal, and graduated with a Bachelor in Science degree. In 1902 he went to the University College Hospital in London to train as a doctor, graduating in 1905 with a degree in medicine and surgery. The same year he earned a Doctorate in Science Degree from the University of Wales for his research. Even though he was offered prestigious positions at other facilities, he remained at the University College Hospital the rest of his life as a “house physician” and lecturer of pathology. After working alongside many of Britain’s most eminent physicians, he was part of the opening of a cardiac unit at University College Hospital. Learning of the Dutch physiologist Dr. Einthoven’s advanced cardiac studies including generated electrical activity of the heart, he visited Einthoven’s laboratory in the Netherlands in 1909. He acquired one of the EKG machines for his laboratory. Later with Einthoven’s permission, he had his own compacted devices made with other improvements including wheels, making it mobile to be taken to wards. In 1909 he published the first paper to describe the irregular heart beat called atrial fibrillation. After publishing a textbook in 1911 on the anatomy of the heart, his 1913 book “Clinical Electrocardiography” was the first textbook ever published on that subject. The chapter 10 of this text was about Mitral Stenosis with regurgitation. During World War I, he studied the symptom called “soldier’s heart” or effort syndrome at the request of the government military pension system and published a textbook on his findings. At the end of the war, his interests turned to other related subjects such as peripheral vascular disease, Raynaud’s Disease and the mechanism of ischemia. He established the clinical cardiac research department at the hospital. Becoming chief of the cardiac department, he was known to be demanding, strict, and wanting excellent work of those on his team, which he received. He worked closely with American physicians, such as Paul Dudley White, to establish cardiac units at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. For decades he taught postgraduate medical students as well as seasoned physicians from around the world. He became a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in 1913, a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1918, plus gave the Croonian Lecture in 1917 and the Harveian Oration in 1931 to the Royal Society. From the Royal Society, he was awarded the Royal Medal in 1927, the Copley Medal in 1941, and the Conway Evans Prize in 1944, “in recognition of his great contribution to medical knowledge on the normal and abnormal mechanisms of the heart and circulation of the blood.” In 1921 he was knighted by George V for his work during World War I. He founded the Medical Research Society in 1930 and edited the professional periodical “Heart” and founded and edited “Clinical Science.” He received five honorary doctorate degrees and was a member of several learned societies. A chain smoker of cigarettes, he suffered his first heart attack at the age of 45, thus stopped smoking as he had earlier proved that nicotine constricts blood vessels. In 1935 he suffered a second heart attack and remarked, “ Another arrow from the same quiver my friend, and one of them will get me in the end.” After his third myocardial infarction he developed heart failure and died in 1945 at the age of 64. He was author of about 240 papers and 12 volumes on the heart, blood vessels and pain, books that saw many editions and were translated into a number of European languages. His last book, “Pain,” was published in 1947 posthumously. In 1916 he married Lorna James and the couple had a son and two daughters. Arthur Hollmann’s biography, “Sir Thomas Lewis: Pioneer Cardiologist and Clinical Scientist” was published in 1997. He was buried in the cemetery that overlooked Llangorse Lake, where he had fished and studied nature as a young boy.