From 2016, the annual UCL student award for academic excellence for the MSc in Prenatal Genetics and Fetal Medicine will be known as the Charles Rodeck Award.
He was also very interested in fetal therapy and in 1981 was the first to describe the treatment of rhesus alloimmunization by a series of fetoscopic blood transfusions, and developed the “Rodeck shunt” for in utero treatment of fetal obstructive uropathy and hydrothorax.
He also achieved financial stability for his research by securing a large grant to establish the first department of Fetal Medicine in the UK, the Harris Birthright Research Centre for Fetal Medicine at King’s College Hospital.
In 1986 he went to Queen Charlotte’s Hospital as Professor at the Institute of Obstetrics and Gynaecology of the Royal Postgraduate Medical School (later Imperial College) and in 1990 he returned to UCL to become head of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, where he set up the renowned Department of Fetal Medicine (now Research Department of Maternal and Fetal Medicine at the Institute for Women's Health).
For many years Charles was the UK authority on fetal medicine, publishing nearly 600 scientific papers on all aspects of prenatal diagnosis and influencing the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists to establish subspecialty training programs. He has numerous awards and honors, among which is the RCOG’s top award, the Eardley Holland Gold Medal, and a national honor, Foundation Fellow of Academy of Medical Sciences.
(Extracts of this text were taken from Presentation of the Ian Donald Gold Medal to Charles Rodeck)