Carey Coombs

Carey Franklin Coombs (1879-1932) was an English cardiologist who practiced medicine at Bristol General Hospital.

Coombs is remembered for his work involving rheumatic and coronary heart disease. He performed important studies of rheumatic fever, and described a rumbling mid-diastolic cardiac murmur that occurs in the acute phase of rheumatic fever. This cardiac murmur is now referred to as the Carey Coombs murmur. In 1910 he made one of the earliest diagnoses of coronary thrombosis, and before his death in 1932, he had documented 144 cases of this condition.

His best known written work is Rheumatic Heart Disease, which was published in 1924. He is also remembered for his work in the management and prevention of childhood heart disease.