Wallace Brigden was at the forefront of the postwar advances in cardiology. He played a key role in the development of cardiology, spurred by new technology, from a predominantly diagnostic specialism to one that could offer powerful medications, surgery and other interventions.

He established that mitral regurgitation was an distinct entity, and not part of mitral stenosis, and he and Aubrey Leatham followed cases for 30 years and more. He wrote papers on the simpler congenital heart diseases and was a world authority on the heart muscle disorders of pregnancy and the puerperium and those due to alcohol. Just as importantly, Brigden was a brilliant, exciting and charismatic teacher.

Wallace William Brigden was educated at the Latymer School. He got an open scholarship to King’s College, Cambridge, where he obtained a double first. In 1937 a scholarship took him to Yale and a further scholarship in 1938 enabled him to complete his medical training at King’s College Hospital in London. He qualified in 1941 and obtained the membership of the Royal College of Physicians in the same year.

In 1943 he joined the RAMC as a specialist physician commanding a medical division until 1947. He was posted to join the Allied Armies in Italy — first at Naples and then via Caserta followed the advance all the way up to Milan. There he witnessed the grim sight of Mussolini and his mistress, after their execution, hanging in the centre of the city in April 1945. He served a further two years in India at the time of partition and was demobilised in 1947.

Once back in London, Brigden became lecturer and physician at the Hammersmith Hospital, but he had been stimulated by his Chief at Kings College Hospital, Terence East, to make cardiology his long term objective and was appointed physician with an interest in cardiology at the London Hospital in 1949.

His appointment to the staff at the London Hospital at the early age of 33 was a bold move. Under Sir James Mackenzie, Sir John Parkinson and William Evans, cardiology had become one of the most prestigious departments. Brigden was a brilliant young doctor but senior appointments usually went to older doctors with a proven track record and from within the hospital. The appointment was an outstanding success and Brigden joined the staff of the Heart Hospital in 1950.

Cardiology had been largely based on the correlation of the patient’s history, the physical signs and post mortem findings. It was concerned with the diagnosis and observation of heart disease since, apart from superb nursing, digitalis, and mercurial diuretics given intravenously, there was little for the cardiologist to offer therapeutically.

In his early days the main function of a teaching hospital cardiologist was to teach medical students and nurses, and Brigden excelled. He brought a new style. Teaching had tended to be didactic and authoritarian, almost by rote, but he was friendly, relaxed and informative. He encouraged students to ask questions and to think for themselves. The London teaching hospitals took great pride in themselves and he was fiercely loyal to the London Hospital and his junior staff.

He entered cardiology at the dawn of a golden age as it was becoming the most exciting specialty in medicine. Cardiac catheterisation and advances in physics and electronics spurred by the Second World War improved imaging, allowing blood pressures and oxygen saturations within the heart to be measured in the living patient.

From 1962 Brigden and others linked these laboratory findings with precise bedside observations. Taking a history and using his eyes, hands and stethoscope with such simple aids as a chest X-ray and electrocardiogram he would make a complete bedside diagnosis. To the students it seemed almost magical. Diagnosis was no longer the end of the story. As time went on patients could be offered powerful medications, surgery and other interventions.

Brigden was at the forefront of the advances in cardiology. He became Director of the Institute of Cardiology, 1962-66, following the early death of Paul Wood. He served as assistant editor of the British Heart Journal and was consultant cardiologist to the Royal Navy. He was chief Medical officer at Munich Re. and was one of the Presidents of the Assurance Medical Society.

When Brigden was visiting Cairo in the 1960s he was invited to conduct a teaching round at the Fin Shams University Hospital. Among the medical students was Eid Fawzy from Aswan. Fawzy was so inspired that he decided to become a cardiologist and to come to England to be trained. He went on to become a world authority on balloon mitral valvoplasty and the balloon dilatation of aortic coarctation. Quite a number of today’s leading cardiologists could tell similar stories. When cardiologists meet his name often comes up in conversation. Everyone has a story to tell — how he brought them into cardiology, how he helped them in a difficult situation, a brilliant diagnosis or some amusing incident. He is remembered with great affection.

In his early sixties he discovered he had glaucoma and had to give up work soon afterwards.

He is survived by his wife Everel, two sons and a daughter from his first marriage and a son and stepson from his second.

Dr Wallace Brigden, cardiologist, was born on June 8, 1916. He died on March 11, 2008, aged 93