UK Kidney History

History of nephrology in the UK and beyond

Martin Knapp

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Martin Knapp

 

 

 

 

 

 

Martin Knapp (1935 – )

by Es Will

Dr Martin Knapp  celebrated his 90th birthday in December 2025  in Melbourne, Australia.

He relinquished a (founding) consultant nephrology post at Nottingham City Hospital in the early 1980s, having been a leader in the campaign to respond to the increasing demand for dialysis in the NHS.1 He was the first to publish the regional need for renal replacement in England, in 1975. His 1967 MD thesis in Bristol left him with a life-long passion for chronobiology. 2-4 He pursued that multidisciplinary hobby in Nottingham, both clinically and, unusually, in the laboratory, with numerous publications. He was one of the first nephrologists to recognise the clinical potential of mini-computing and edited a special issue of Kidney International advertising it in 1983.5,6 He applied that insight further through mathematics, which resulted in a sophisticated analysis of transplant rejection related to timing of medication.7  His imperative desire to continue a hybrid clinical and academic career was not supported.8 He left the NHS, following a more general medical career overseas, ultimately in Australia. His enthusiasm for chronomedicine, which has had something of a modern revival, has never waned and he responded with textbook chapters only last year.9,10

References

  1. https://ukkidneyhistory.org/timeline/1980s-scaling-provision/tactics-and-strategy-local-and-national-initiatives-in-uk-nephrology-prior-to-1990/
  2. Shaw DB, Knapp MS, Davies DH. Variations of bloodpressure in hypertensives during sleep. 1963;1(7285):797-9. doi: 10.1016/s0140-6736(63)91503.
  3. Knapp MS, Keane PM, Wright JG. Circadian rhythm of plasma 11-hydroxycorticosteroids in depressive illness, congestive heart failure, and Cushing’s syndrome. Br Med J. 1967;2(5543):27-30. doi: 10.1136/bmj.2.5543.27.
  4. Knapp MS. Nocturia and Reversed Circadian Rhythms. J R Coll Physicians Lond. 1969 Jul;3(4):398-405.
  5. https://ukkidneyhistory.org/themes/renal-it-and-the-registry/ccl-timeline
  6. Knapp MS, Smith AF, Trimble IM, Pownall R, Gordon K. Mathematical and statistical aids to evaluate data from renal patients. Kidney Int. 1983;24(4):474-86. doi: 10.1038/ki.1983.184.
  7. Trimble IM, West M, Knapp MS, Pownall R, Smith AF. Detection of renal allograft rejection by computer. Br Med J (Clin Res Ed). 1983 May 28;286(6379):1695-9. doi: 10.1136/bmj.286.6379.1695.
  8. https://ukkidneyhistory.org/misc/too-hot-to-handle/
  9. Erren TC, Koch MS, Groß JV et al. Chronomedicine: an old concept’s fledging? A selective literature search. Neuro Endocrinol Lett. 2012;33(4):357-60.
  10. Chronobiology and chronomedicine: From molecular and cellular mechanisms to whole body interdigitating networks. Eds Cornelissen G and Hirota T, London, Royal Society of Chemistry, 2024, 716 pp., ISBN 978-1-83916-200-8.

 

Last Updated on December 7, 2025 by John Feehally