Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, November 26, 1995 TAG: 9511270107
SECTION: BOOKS PAGE: G-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: REVIEWED BY SIDNEY BARRITT
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Dr. Armand Quick was a medical scientist who was justly renowned for his research into the mechanisms of blood coagulation and the disorders of this vital bodily process. Foremost among his many contributions was the discovery of the test referred to as the "Prothrombin Time" or PT for short. This test measures a vital part of the coagulation scheme and is used many thousands of times daily throughout the world, often for patients about to undergo surgery. For a time after its description, the test was called the Quick Test after its discoverer.
His daughter, a Blacksburg resident, has written his biography, relying in large part on a personal diary that Quick kept for the whole of his scientific and professional life.
The book is a labor of love but I fear it will satisfy few outside the family or the circle of his friends and associates. The narrative is heavy on the personal details that one might include in a diary but woefully light on scientific or professional detail that one might have found in his laboratory notebooks. The physician or scientist reading Quick's life might want to know what led him to investigate this particular problem; what hypotheses he formulated; how he tried to prove them; what false trails he followed; and how he ultimately came to the Quick Test.
There must be a good story in Quick's work because the unraveling of nature's processes and secrets is surely as exciting as a good murder mystery. Unfortunately, that story waits for another.
Sidney Barritt is a Roanoke physician.
by CNB