Florence Gabrielle Abiola Adeniran

Florence Gabrielle Abiola Adeniran LRCP (Lond.) MRCS (Eng.) MPH (Mich.) (born Florence Gabrielle Abiola Martins; October 29, 1930) is a Nigerian surgeon and medical practitioner. She made history as the first woman to gain a medical degree in a Nigerian university, the University of Ibadan (UI). Later, Dr Adeniran became the first female Director of a Nigerian health management board in 1986.

Early life

She was born in Lagos Island, Lagos, Nigeria the second of five children. Her father Frederick George Martins (1896-1968) was a senior civil servant in the British colonial civil service, while her mother Florence Iyadunni Martins (née Olumide) (1903-1980) was Principal of Abeokuta Girls Grammar School, Abeokuta. Her paternal great-great-grandfather was the merchant Antonio "Ojo" Martins (1805-1857) in whose honour Martins Street, Lagos Island was named by Governor of Lagos Colony, Sir John Hawley Glover. Her paternal great-grandfather was Pedro Pancho "P. P." Martins (1838-1919) the first appointed judge of Abeokuta, and her maternal grandfather was Reverend Jacob Josiah Olumide (1858-1924). She has Yoruba and Portuguese ancestry.

She grew up Lagos with her godmother Lady Oyinkan Abayomi, while her parents were working in Enugu, and she attended CMS Girls Seminary Primary School, Lagos followed by girls secondary school Queen's College, Lagos at the age of 9 years in January 1940 and finished in 1946. Being a girls school, Queen's College did not have any science classes to aid the pursuit of medicine as a profession. She, therefore, enrolled for science and biology classes at boys schools CMS Grammar School, Lagos and King's College, Lagos until taking the entrance examination into another all-male environment Yaba Higher College in 1948 which was the first tertiary educational institution in Nigeria, founded in 1932. It was also the only institution in West Africa where medicine could be studied.

Medical Education

Shortly before her admission in 1948, Yaba Higher College was transferred from Lagos to Ibadan, as an outpost of University of London becoming the University College (now University of Ibadan), and those candidates who had passed into it for the 1948 academic year as she did, became the foundation students of the University College (now University of Ibadan). She attended the University College (now the University of Ibadan) from 1948 to 1953 and was the only woman in medical school.

In 1953, she was featured in Life Magazine (4 May 1953, pages 71–74) in several photographs taken by German-born American photographer and journalist Alfred Eisenstaedt, best known for his photograph of the V-J Day in Times Square celebration and portraits of Sophia Loren.

From 1953 to 1961, she attended University of London's Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine, London (U.K.), gaining her LRCP and MRCS under the guardianship of Professor Ruth Bowden OBE (1915 - 2001), pioneer of nerve damage repair in leprosy and special research into polio.

Career

Dr Adeniran's working career began in 1961 as a House Surgeon at Amersham General Hospital, England and Sutton & Cheam General Hospital, England, where one of her patients was the former British Prime Minister Clement Attlee (1945-1951). She returned to Nigeria in 1963, after having married barrister Adedapo Adeniran of Lincoln's Inn in 1961 whom she had met in London during 1957. She worked as a Medical Officer in the public health sector starting at Massey Street Children's Hospital, Lagos in 1963, then Island Maternity Hospital, followed by Igbobi Infectious Diseases Hospital, Lagos and the Ministry of Health, Lagos. Although she received various offers for administrative positions early on, she continued her surgical work for 11 years. Her career coincided with Civil War and post-Civil War Nigeria. The problems of malnutrition among the casualties were great, and her researches contributed to the advances that were made in the knowledge and management of such malnutrition.

In 1973, she became a Master of Public Health (M.P.H.) at the University of Michigan (U.S.), followed by participation in maternal and child health advances with the United Nations Population Fund (UNPF) in Warsaw, Poland. Following her return to Lagos, between 1973 and 1986, she was a Senior Consultant-In-Charge of a series of large health centres across the metropolis.

She served on the Lagos Island District Management Committee and Lagos Mainland District Management Committee, where she continued to make contributions to the development of maternal and child health education and services in Nigeria over two decades. From 1986 to 1990, she served as Director of Medical Services for Lagos State Hospitals Management Board, the first woman to do so. Throughout her career, she sought and worked for the improvement of basic health services in the dense urban areas of Nigeria. In her concern for women and their role in society, Dr Adeniran was active in the Medical Women's Association of Nigeria (MWAN) for many years, and served as its President (1985-1987).

Dr. Adeniran is a member of the World Association of Medical Women, British Medical Association, Nigeria Medical Association, and Lagos State Medical Association.

Personal life

She is married to the barrister and author Adedapo Adeniran. She has two children, and five grandchildren. She lives in Lagos and retired from medical service in 1990.