Sir Harold Delf Gillies: A New Principle in the Treatment of Congenital Cleft Palate and Its Mechanical Counterpart. British Medical Journal. Vol 1, No 3140, pp. 335–338. March 5 1921

Sir Harold Delf Gillies (1882–1960) was a New Zealand surgeon whose practices greatly influenced the advancement of modern maxillofacial and plastic surgery. The first part of this chapter will describe and put into context Gillies’ novel surgical technique to correct congenital cleft palate, which he developed as part of a combined prosthetic treatment with his colleague W. Kelsey Fry. Originally published in 1921 in the British Medical Journal, this method provided improved mastication, soft palate function, and limited damage to developing dentition when compared to other contemporaneous technique. The second part of this chapter will review key points of Gillies’ life including his early childhood and education, formative experience treating facial injuries sustained on the battlefields of World War I, innovations in reconstructive plastic surgery, as well as his later career and legacy.