All members are invited to submit nominations for Honorary Fellowships each year. The award of Honorary Fellow is the highest accolade that the RCOphth can bestow, recognising individuals who have made a significant contribution to ophthalmology.
Nominations for the 2025 Honorary Fellows are now open until 12 December 2024.
Nomination-for-Honorary-Fellowship-form-2025
Individuals can be from any field of ophthalmic science, research and medicine or a member of the general public, so long as their work has inspired, contributed to or made an impact in the field of ophthalmology and the wider eye health sector. Generally, awards are made to one or two individuals each year.
The honour is conferred at the Admissions Ceremony held every year in September. A citation summarising the recipient’s achievement is delivered at the ceremony and edited versions appears in College News, or you can view a link to the citations against the Honorary Fellow name in the table below.
Our current Honorary Fellows
1992:
Wallace S Foulds CBE
1993:
Richard Keeler
Sir Terence English
1995:
Stephen M Drance OC
1996:
Jean Jacques de Laey
1997:
Lord Turnberg KBE
1998:
Alexander L Crombie
Björn Thylefors
Brian Martin
1999:
Eva M Kohner OBE
Sidney I Davidson
Sir Kenneth C Calman KCB
2001:
Michael D Sanders
William R Lee CBE
2002:
Alan Bird
George Borthwick CBE
Jean, Lady Wilson OBE
2003:
Desmond Archer OBE
Gordon Johnson
Gottfried O H Naumann
2005:
John Marshall
Alec Garner
Margaret Hallendorff MBE
2006:
Anthony Chignell MBE
Keith M Waddell
David Taylor
2007:
Anthony J Bron
2008:
Jeffrey L Jay CBE
2009:
John E Wright
Sohan Singh Hayreh
2010:
Paul A Hunter
Timothy John ffytche
2011:
Michael Brace CBE
Stanley Piers B Percival
2012:
Alistair R Fielder
2013:
Nicholas J Astbury
2014:
John Forrester
2015:
Brenda Billington OBE
2016:
Richard Collin
Allen Foster
2017:
2018:
2019:
2020:
Professor Clare Gilbert
Professor Ian George Rennie
2021:
2022:
2023:
Professor Sarah Ellen Coupland
Andrew Jacks
Fiona Spencer
2024:
Kathy Evans
Professor Christopher Liu
Professor Geoff Rose