page_title: Patrick Clarkson
section_title: Poland syndrome
hierarchical_section_title: Patrick Clarkson / Poland syndrome
caption_attribution_description: original Alfred Poland's description of Poland syndrome
context_page_description: Patrick Wensley Clarkson, MBE, FRCS, was a plastic surgeon at Guy's Hospital in London, best known for surgery of the hand and the description of "Poland Syndactyly", later termed Poland syndrome.
  Born in New Zealand, he studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh after which he entered Guy's Hospital. His experiences during the Second World War and his training with Sir Harold Gillies in burns and facial injuries led to an internationally acclaimed career in that area. He published extensively in textbooks and journals, lectured widely on burns in children and founded the Hand Club.
context_section_description: Whilst at Guy’s in 1962, Clarkson described three people with breast hypoplasia and joining of fingers. His son later explained how his father discovered the 1841 work of Alfred Poland, an anatomy student at the time who described a body with a hypoplastic webbed hand associated with chest wall deformities. Alfred Poland's friend had made illustrations of the head, neck, and chest anomalies but not the hand. However, Clarkson found the preserved hand in the hospital museum and described it in further detail, subsequently coining the term “Poland syndactyly” in an article in the same journal as Arthur Poland’s original report. Five years later, P. Baudinne and colleagues named the condition "Poland syndrome".
caption: Alfred Poland's original description of the syndrome
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