My uncle, Denis Keating, who has died aged 88, was a geriatrician who championed the speciality in Ireland and helped to expand specialist medical services for older people.
Denis was born in Dublin, an only son with five sisters, to Lucy (nee Killackey), a secretary, and Daniel Keating, a civil service accountant.
As a boy, he was precocious. Attending Terenure college, Dublin, he was known to dawdle on the way to school, examining insects and flowers. He later attended the Cistercian college in Roscrea, Tipperary, as a boarding student, completing his Irish leaving certificate at the early age of 16. He studied medicine at University College Dublin, where he qualified at the age of 22 in 1958.
Following appointments in Dublin, Limerick and Cork, in the late 1960s Denis worked in geriatric medicine with Bernard Isaacs at Birmingham University. After a brief period in Oxford, he was appointed in 1973 as consultant physician in geriatric medicine to the evolving North Dublin geriatric service based at St Mary’s hospital, Phoenix Park, and at Richmond and Connolly hospitals. In 1975, he became the first consultant physician in geriatric medicine in St Vincent’s hospital, Dublin.
Denis was passionate about promoting geriatric medicine and the needs of older people. When he arrived at St Vincent’s, there were no dedicated geriatric acute assessment and rehabilitation facilities. He succeeded in pushing for the construction of a state of the art unit at a time when public money was scarce and there was little support for geriatric medicine.
In 1974 Denis was a founding member of the Irish Society of Physicians in Geriatric Medicine and its president from 1998 to 2000. He was also a president of the Irish Gerontological Society. Great company and passionate about his work, he inspired many medical students and doctors to pursue a career in the field.
In 1999 he retired from St Vincent’s, but continued to practise at Tallaght University hospital, St Michael’s hospital in Dún Laoghaire and St John of God hospital, Dublin, until 2005, and retired from private practice in 2010.
Outside medicine he had a keen interest in history and music and regularly attended the opera. He was a gentle, generous and compassionate man, who always fed stray cats.
He is survived by his sister Frances and by 14 nephews and nieces.
