GP and campaigner;
Born: June 24, 1946; Died: January 1, 2013.
Julian Toms, who has died aged 66, was a well-known general practitioner on Skye who was involved in many community projects and campaigns, including the abolition of tolls on the Skye Bridge. He was also a founding member of the Skye and Lochalsh Ski Club and played the fiddle in musical group The Stormyhill Scrapers.
He was born in Cornwall, the son of champion ploughman Roy Toms and his wife Muriel, who came from a farming family. He studied medicine at Cambridge, where he was also a member of the Cambridge Western Himalayan Expedition. Along with a group of fellow medical students, he received sponsorship to drive overland to India in a Land Rover collecting samples for parasitology studies.
After completing his clinical studies at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, his first job was at Treliske Hospital in Cornwall. By this time he was married; his first daughter Clare was born in 1970, his second Polly in 1972. But the family found Cornwall congested and began to consider a move to Scotland to get more space and the do some skiing in winter.
Dr Toms applied for a job in Craig Dunain Hospital in Inverness and lived there for a year with his family. His next move was to Muasdale, on the west coast of Kintyre, to single-handedly run a GP surgery and where he played the fiddle in a group called the Cornkisters. Nine years later he moved to St Andrews and worked at Dundee Royal Infirmary and at Ninewells in the neurology department.
He moved to Skye in 1984, returning to general practice in Portree. In 1989 he married Christine and their daughters Kirsty and Lucy were born in 1992 and 1993. In Portree he was closely involved with the design and building of the new surgery. He also became involved in community projects and groups, including the campaign for the abolition of tolls on the Skye Bridge for which he received a criminal record.
Away from the practice, he completed two six-month sabbaticals in Maori areas of New Zealand with his family. He loved running and managed to complete his 25th Portree half marathon in June last year, despite illness. He was also a keen skier although his greatest hobby was fishing. He took all four children and four grandchildren out fishing.
He was an outstanding doctor, an important community fundraiser for Cancer Research Scotland, Cancer Care and Lucky2bhere and always had time to listen to people. Having lost both his parents in their 50s, he understood the importance of charities such as these. He was also involved in the setting up of the palliative care bed in Portree Hospital.
He coped bravely with his illness over the last 20 months and will be dearly missed by many whose lives he touched.
He is survived by his sister Jenny, wife Christine, daughters Clare, Polly, Kirsty and Lucy and four grandchildren.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article