He was educated at the Royal Grammar School, Newcastle, trained at Cambridge University and Street Thomas" Hospital, qualifying in 1971 and subsequently specialising in gastroenterology (diseases of the digestive tract), specifically liver disease.
Having spent time in the United States at the University of California, San Diego (1979–1980), as an Medical Research Council Travelling Fellow he assumed a consultant post at Royal Liverpool University Hospital. He was made honorary professor at the University of Liverpool in 1999. In 2001 he chaired a Royal College of Physicians working party that produced the report "Alcohol – can the National Health Service afford it?"
During his time as president of the College from 2006 to 2010 he made several public statements on alcohol misuse in the United Kingdom, and under his leadership the Royal College initiated the Alcohol Health Alliance United Kingdom in 2007.
He was knighted in the 2010 Queen"s Birthday Honours.
In August 2010, Sir Ian said that "making drugs such as heroin and cocaine legal would "drastically" cut crime and addicts’ health problems" in interviews with both newspapers and the British Broadcasting Corporation.
