Robert Proust

Robert Proust (1873 to 1935) was a French urologist and gynaecologist and the younger brother of the novelist Marcel Proust. Born in Paris to the public health physician Adrien Proust, he studied medicine at the University of Paris and began his internships in 1894 under Félix Guyon. His 1900 paper on total perineal prostatectomy became a landmark, and colleagues nicknamed the operation the proustatectomie. His textbook on the surgery of the female genital tract, first published in 1904, reached six editions by 1927, and in the fifth edition he added radium treatment of cervical cancer. He assisted Samuel Pozzi at the Hôpital Broca, directed it from 1932 to 1934, and served as a military surgeon in the First World War, devising a mobile operating theatre called the auto-chir. After his brother's death he prepared the final three volumes of Marcel's novel for publication.