Professor Denis K Donovan
Dean, UCD School of Medicine
1965 – 1973

Denis O'Donovan1

Portrait artist: Pat Phelan (Oil on canvass) 

BORN 1909 | DIED 2004

Denis K (Kenry) O’Donovan, known as DK, was born in 1909 and grew up at Castleconnell, Co Limerick.  He enrolled at UCD for pre-clinical studies in one of the last medical classes to enter the portals of Newman's Catholic University Medical School building in Cecilia Street which closed in 1931.

He graduated with a BSc in 1933 and with an MD in 1941 and achieved first place with first-class honours in both degrees. He then graduated with an MSc in Physiology in 1935.

DK conducted his initial clinical studies at St Vincent's Hospital, which was then located on St Stephen's Green.  He graduated from McGill University, Montreal with a PhD in Biochemistry, magna cum laude in 1938.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (London) in 1963, an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland in 1969 and awarded a DSc in 1982.

DK returned initially to UCD as researcher in physiology and then became a lecturer in therapeutics in 1947 and Associate Professor of Medicine in 1951.

Then following an OECD Travelling Fellowship to review education at leading US Medical Schools, DK became Senior Professor of Medicine in 1958, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine from 1965-73, a member of the college's Governing Body from 1967-77 and of its Finance Committee from 1970-74 which were critical years in driving the move to the Belfield campus.

DK was also intricately involved in the establishment of the new hospital and teaching facilities at St Vincent’s Hospital on the Elm Park campus which opened in 1971.

DK sat for many years on the Medical Research Council of Ireland and served as Council Chairperson from 1973 to 1986. 

He was involved in many international bodies, including the European Association of Internal Medicine, the American Thyroid Association, the Thyroid Club, the Royal Society of Medicine and the Society of Endocrinology, which he helped establish in 1946 in London. 

He was also President of the Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland in 1975 and a Founding Member and President of the Irish Endocrine Society from 1978 to 1980.

DK’s lifetime interest in the study of thyroid disorders and their association with developmental anomalies of the hand “DK’s Little Fingers” would be well remembered by generations of medical students.