After gaining his MD degree from Liverpool, Wright lectured at the University of Leeds for two years before becoming a research fellow at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. In 1964 he returned to Leeds as a Consultant Physician and Senior Lecturer, where he helped establish a specialist rheumatology unit. In 1970 he was appointed Professor of Rheumatology in the Department of Medicine at Leeds, a post he held until his retirement in 1994.
