David Russell 1948–2022

In the last decade neurosonology has developed into an important discipline in the field of stroke. No history of neurosonology would be completed without the name David Russell (Figure 1).

Figure 1.

David Russell 1948–2022.

He was born in Kells, County Antrim on 31.01.1948 in Northern Ireland. He studied medicine at Queens University, Belfast, where he qualified in 1972. He worked in Southampton and London before moving to Norway. He started working in the department of neurology at Rikshospitalet in Oslo in 1976 and finished his PhD at the University of Oslo in 1985. He became a professor of neurology in 1989 and continued to work at Rikshospitalet and the University of Oslo until retirement in 2020.

His main research areas were neurosonology and emboli detection. He published more than 300 articles in peer reviewed journals and he developed the first Transcranial Multifrequency Doppler together with Prof. Rainer Brucher. Professor Russell was the founder of the European Society of Neurosonology and Cerebral Hemodynamics (ESNCH) in 1998.

As a farewell to the dearest friend, the three former Presidents of the ESNCH share with us their personal memories and feelings expressing in the best way all the values the ESNCH inherited from David. Dr. Brækken writes a short comment from the side of a close colleague in Oslo and the current ESNCH President issues a statement on behalf of the ESNCH Executive Committee.

Natan M Bornstein

David and I traveled together through the neurosonology road for almost four decades. The road was sometimes narrow, tortuous, and bumpy but David had always shown us the right direction like a bright flushing light with a lot of optimism.

He was a visionary man and after some years of American Neurosonology conferences he thought of founding the ESNCH. His enthusiasm, charm, and organizational skills carried us all with him.

We had a tradition to get together the night before the traditional “winter meeting” of the ESNCH and discuss various topics. Over several glasses of beer we could exchange ideas and personal experiences. He was a genuine friend and I always waited eagerly to these meetings. He used to come to our conferences with his dear wife Jeanette who herself became a close friend during the years.

David, the Neurosonology world will not be the same without you as a leader and a friend but your legacy will be carried on by your many pupils and colleagues forever.

László Csiba

David was a very delightful man. When he saw me, he called my name out from far away. He hugged me, his face radiating sincere joy. He loved life, he loved to eat and drink, dance, and talk to friends.

I am proud that he entrusted me with the successes and failures of his personal life. For me, a valuable person is one, who dares to share not only the bright side of his life, but also divulges his problems and his weaknesses with a friend. It makes a person greater rather than lesser.

I have never seen anyone create such simple, yet informative slides and animations as he did for his lectures. I admired his original scientific ideas. They were always born out of clinical experience. He radiated the impression of not only an excellent scientist but also of a great clinician.

And finally, the sobering truth. When a friend starts his endless journey, a piece of us is broken off, like pieces from an ice-floe in the warming ocean. This is how we also pass away, drifting toward known and unknown destinations, like ice-floe, slowly dissolving in a sea of memories.

Dear David,

May the earth be light to you.

“You have finished the race; you have kept the faith.” (2 Timothy 4:7)

Claudio Baracchini

Dear David,

Although you recently left this life on earth, I cannot think of you in the past tense.

You are the founder of the ESNCH, and the guiding spirit for all of us and for many young neurologists who admired your optimistic vision and especially your actions always directed toward the welfare and benefit of the Society.

Those who had the privilege to be your friends cannot forget your love for life, generous hugs, contagious smiles, and commensality strengthening cohesion among us. Always with a special focus on less fortunate younger colleagues.

Your soul has set out for a very long journey toward eternal freedom. But as nothing is lost, nothing is created, everything is transformed, I am sure you have become like those high energy signals that you have studied for so many years, enlightening a land with no limits of time and space. And when you’ll meet your parents again, remembering your Irish roots, you will start singing:

“. . …I’ll go home to my parents, confess what I’ve done

And I’ll ask them to pardon their prodigal son

And when they’ve caressed me, as oft times before

I never will play the wild rover no more

And it’s no, nay, never

No, nay never no more

Will I play the wild rover

No never no more” (from The Wild Rover)

Ciao David

from Claudio, Giorgio, Nicola, and all your Italian friends

Sigrun Kierulf Brækken

David was a good friend and a good colleague. He was curious, energetic, and creative. His colleagues loved traveling with him to conferences. His charm and impulsiveness made him never boring to be around.

Branko Malojcic

Family atmosphere can be felt during formal and informal meetings of the ESNCH. The manners of communication and the ways we care about every single member are inherited by David Russell. As in every big family, one of the saddest moments in lives of a society is when the founder passes away. David Russell left us on April 21, 2022. We will never forget what he did for the ESNCH and how he did it with warmth of his personality and his profound knowledge. David was a lighthouse that attracted and guided so many of us to neurosonology.