Dr. Ian Thomas Jackson (1934–2020): A “Messiah” of the Deformed

Abstract

Summary:Ian Thomas Jackson was born and bred in Scotland and eventually settled in the United States. He rose to dizzying heights in his career due to his role in shaping the specialty of craniofacial surgery, not only in the United States but in the rest of the world. Jackson was first missed in Scotland, which lost this talented surgeon to America very early in his career; now this is everyone's loss, as we will all miss him forever. He was a skilled surgeon, great friend, and wonderful human being who touched the lives of innumerable patients with difficult deformities around the world. He never let any constraints affect his philanthropy and ushered a boy in Peru who had been abandoned by his parents through 80 operations, with a later adoption into the Jackson family, which is remarkable and unmatched by anyone even today. Jackson left indelible marks on the history and development of plastic surgery around the world and especially India, where he was introduced by Prof. Ramesh Chandra of Lucknow. The trailblazing and successful craniofacial surgeries conducted by Dr. Jackson in North India in the 1980s eventually opened the doors to the intriguing world of craniofacial surgery for the Indian plastic surgeon diaspora. He is in true sense a “messiah” of the deformed.