Rodney Maingot was born on February 27th 1893 in Cascade, Trinidad. At the age of 8 he migrated to England, where he obtained all his academic training. He studied at Upshaw College, Durham and at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital in London.

He qualified as a doctor in 1916 with the Membership of the Royal College of Surgeons, England (MRCS) and the Licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians (LRCP). At St. Bartholomew’s he worked as a house surgeon and surgical registrar and obtained the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons, England (FRCS) in 1920. In the midst of attaining these qualifications, Dr. Maingot also served in the First World War, 1914-1918.

He was a regional consultant in the Emergency Medical Service during World War II and fellow of the surgical section of the Royal Society of Medicine. He served as the Editor-in-Chief of the British Journal of Clinical Practice and apart from his best-known publication, Maingot also contributed to a two-volume surgical reference “Postgraduate Surgery”.

Maingot was elected the Chief Surgeon at the Royal Free Hospital and was considered an expert in surgery of the gall bladder. His popularity as a skilled surgeon was witnessed through the number of young surgeons that came to see him operate at the Royal Waterloo and Southend Hospitals in London where he served as a consulting surgeon. As a result, these hospitals became key centres for postgraduate instruction in surgery and his reputation as a surgeon grew outside of London.

During his career, he was also a visiting specialist and professor at institutions outside of the UK. They included Ohio State Medical School, Mount Sinai Hospital in Miami and Maadi Hospital in Cairo. In 1976, Dr. Maingot was awarded his homeland’s highest honour, the Trinity Cross.

After his death in England on January 3rd 1982, his family established the Maingot Charitable Trust in his honour. The Trust assists young doctors from Trinidad and Tobago to qualify for the FRCS by providing a scholarship grant. The Trust has to date already assisted some 22 scholars over the past 21 years since its inception.