Michele Tyrer obituary – The Guardian

My wife, Michele Tyrer, who has died aged 73, was a nurse who was part of a groundbreaking research team in New York and later worked as a research nurse and hypnotherapist in Newcastle.

Michele was a liberal in a family of conservatives. She was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, to Jim Hill, a pilot in the US Air Corps in the second world war, and his wife, Betty (nee Cummins), a secretary in a utilities company.

She attended Catholic high school in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, and achieved grades sufficient for her to go to university but her family could not afford the tuition. She trained as a nurse at St Joseph hospital in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, graduating in 1968.

She then moved to New York and married Sheldon Aronson, a designer, at the age of 21 and had a son. The couple divorced three years later. Michele worked in a number of hospitals before obtaining a post at the Rusk Institute for Rehabilitation Medicine. Her experience there of working with patients disabled by brain and limb injuries and who had limited health insurance cemented her strong sense of fairness. Unlike the rest of her family, she voted for Lyndon Johnson in 1963, when she was first able to vote.

In 1974 she was selected to take part in a research study examining whether patients with dementia could benefit from hyperbaric oxygen therapy. She enjoyed the research environment and shortly afterwards joined the pioneering research unit of the neuroscientist Sam Gershon at Bellevue hospital. This unit was the first in the US to examine the value of lithium in the treatment of bipolar affective illness and carried out research into schizophrenia and Alzheimers disease.

Michele became its head research nurse, responsible for coordinating trials. She was co-author of seven papers, including two published in The Archives of General Psychiatry, the most widely cited psychiatric publication in the world.

I met Michele when she was appointed head research nurse in the unit where I worked at New York University. We married in 1980 and moved to the UK when I became a senior lecturer at Newcastle University. We never left.

After having two more children, in the 1980s Michele worked for three years at Prudhoe hospital, for those with intellectual disability, again in research. She later qualified as a hypnotherapist and worked for seven years in this field, mainly with patients with chronic pain. She retired in 2007.

In the UK, Michele initially joined Labour but was later an advocate of the local Liberal party. As a governor at West Jesmond primary school she always did her best to support the underdog and oppose cuts.

In retirement, Michele devoted herself to her family. She was a staunch remainer and was despondent at the route that her adopted country took four years ago. All our children are now living outside the UK in part as a result of Brexit.

She is survived by me, her children, Adam, Willow and Sam, by grandchildren, Vivienne, Evan, Sofia, Skye, Ru and Fox, and by two of her three siblings, Kristin and Jay.

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Michele Tyrer obituary - The Guardian