Patrick Steptoe was a British obstetrician, gynaecologist and a pioneer of fertility treatment, who, together with British medical researcher Robert Edwards, perfected in vitro fertilization (IVF) of the human egg. Their technique made possible the birth of Louise Brown, the world’s first “test-tube baby,” on July 25, 1978.
Background
Patrick Christopher Steptoe was born on June 9, 1913, in Oxfordshire, England. His father was a church organist, while his mother served as a social worker. As a young man, Steptoe took an interest in music. He played piano, accompanying silent films at a local cinema, and participated in recitals at a local church. At eighteen he was appointed organist and musical director of the Christchurch Musical Society in Oxford, delaying his university entry until he turned twenty.
Education
Steptoe was educated at The Grammar School, Witney (since 1968 the comprehensive Henry Box School) in Oxfordshire. He then studied medicine at the University of London’s St. George Hospital Medical School and, after being licensed in 1939, became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons. His medical career, though, was interrupted by World War II.
Following the war, Steptoe completed additional studies in obstetrics and gynaecology.
Career
Steptoe volunteered as a naval surgeon, but he and his shipmates were captured by Italian forces in 1941 after their ship sank in the Battle of Crete. Initially granted special privileges in prison because he was a physician, Steptoe was placed in solitary confinement after officials detected his efforts to help fellow prisoners escape. Steptoe left the prison camp via a prisoner exchange in 1943.
In 1948 he became a member of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and moved to Manchester to set up a private practice. In 1951 Steptoe began working at Oldham General and District Hospital in northeast England. While at Oldham General and District Hospital, Steptoe pursued his interest in fertility problems. He developed a method of procuring human eggs from the ovaries by using a laparoscope, a long thin telescope replete with fiber optics light. After inserting the device—through a small incision in the navel— into the inflated abdominal cavity, Steptoe was able to observe the reproductive tract. Eventually the laparoscope would become widely used in various types of surgery, including those associated with sterility. But, at first, Steptoe had trouble convincing others in the medical profession of the merits of laparoscopy; observers from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists considered the technique fraught with difficulties.
In 1966 Steptoe partnered with Robert Edwards, an embryologist from Cambridge; working together brought a new dynamic to their research. Utilizing ovaries removed for medical reasons, Edwards had pioneered the fertilization of eggs outside of the body. With his laparoscope, Steptoe added the dimension of being able to secure mature eggs at the appropriate moment in the monthly cycle when fertilization would normally occur. The next year, Steptoe published a book on Laparoscopy in Gynaecology.
A breakthrough for the duo came in 1968 when Edwards successfully fertilized an egg that Steptoe had extracted. Not until 1970, however, was an egg able to reach the stage of cell division—into about one hundred cells—when it generally moves to the uterus.
Steptoe became the Director of the Centre for Human Reproduction, Oldham in 1969. Using laparoscopy, he collected the ova from volunteering infertile women who saw his place as their last hope to achieve a pregnancy. Edwards and Jean Purdy provided the laboratory expertise. During this time they had to endure criticism and hostility to their work. Finally, in 1978, the birth of Louise Brown changed everything. Although he encountered further criticism, other clinics were able to follow the lead and patients responded. To accommodate the increased patient number and train specialists, he, Purdy, and Edwards founded the Bourn Hall Clinic, Cambridgeshire in 1980 of which Steptoe was a Medical Director until his death.
During his career, Steptoe published two works, Laparoscopy in Gynaecology and A Matter of Life: The Story of a Medical Breakthrough.
Connections
Steptoe was married to a former actress and had 2 children, one son and one daughter.