Hippocrates today.

Not many dentists `retire' to write books on economics, philosophy and faith. But James Dyce has always been unique.

Dyce's father was a young Aberdeenshire farmer who came to Glasgow in the Depression and made good. James Dyce gained degrees in medicine and dentistry in Scotland, and a doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania. Aged 24, he was invited to join a prestigious dental practice in Harley Street, the heart of London's private medical establishment. Through Bible Class and the Oxford Group (later MRA) he developed a deep faith and a desire to pass it on.

Dyce made a valuable contribution during World War II through his service in the Training Films Department of the War Office. His film on the battlefield treatment of facial injuries is still used in basic training at the Royal Army Medical College. He also invented a miniature camera for filming damage to the mouth.

He and his wife Dilly bought a house in Harley Street where they could entertain some of his patients, among whom were household names.

One such patient was Selwyn Lloyd, then Foreign Minister. It was the time of the Mau Mau troubles in Kenya. Dyce showed Lloyd an MRA film, Freedom, which dramatized the human dimension in the peaceful transition to democracy from colonial rule in an African country. Lloyd arranged for the film to be shown to Jomo Kenyatta, the future President, in exile. At Kenyatta's request the film was dubbed into Swahili and shown across the country. A senior police officer said that it played a vital part in the peaceful way Kenya's pre-independence elections were conducted.

In the Eighties, after many years in Harley Street, Dyce felt that his mind needed restocking. Aged 64, he was accepted to study philosophy at King's College, Cambridge. The Dyces set up home in the village of Lavenham, Suffolk, where he opened a part-time dental practice. This gave him his first exposure to the National Health Service.

Since 1982, he has written eight books aiming to offer the front runners of his profession a goal beyond personal gain.

His Cambridge studies led him to re-evaluate Adam Smith, the father of capitalism, whom Dyce believes has been short-changed by economists who ignore his moral and spiritual dimension. Dyce sees this as the root of today's economic mayhem. The Adam Smith Institute adopted his book, The rescue of capitalism, getting Adam Smith right, at the time of Smith's bi-centenary.

His beloved wife of 44 years died just as his latest book, Hippocrates for today (1), was being published. This is a `how to' book of case-studies from a lifetime of clinical spiritual experience: how to live life fruitfully; how to fashion new ways of thinking for those who may be too busy to think; how to make core-truths understandable and applicable. The Dental Update called it `required reading'.

(1) Available from Grosvenor Books, 54 Lyford Rd, London SW18 3JJ, price [pounds sterling]9.95