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Bob came to Dubbo in the 1960s as a young surgeon. In this interview he discusses his long career as a doctor and the many changes he has been a part of including developments at Dubbo Base Hospital, the introduction of breast care screening in Dubbo and the establishment of the School of Rural Health.
Transcript Excerpt
(I): The late ‘60s there was a lot of change going on in the hospital here. They sold their hotel and that financed a lot of extensions.
Yes the hospital keep growing all the time. When I came here it was pretty awful out the back, there's a TB ward which was just a wooden old building, and maternity was just a wooden building. They gradually rebuilt the back of the hospital. The only thing that remains now that you can see where it was – well there's nothing there that reminds you of the past when it's all been pulled down, it was all wooden buildings. The operating theatre just opened out onto the street at the back of the hospital. There was very little air conditioning and B ward was the male ward and the verandahs were just open, I think they gauzed it in after a while.
(I): Is that what they knew as the Samuels ward or was it different?
(S): I don't remember the Samuels ward?
(I): Well I it was mainly a male ward. Originally they were going to make it a female ward but I don't think it ever happened, built in the ‘30s.
(S): A ward is still there at the front. It’s the cardiac rehab ward now. Children’s ward was the opposite side which I think is physio - that was children's ward. But what was the hospital then, there's nothing left of it that would remind you of the old hospital really. B ward is pulled down. Then they built S Block and M Block and they got it a little bit wrong with the levels because when they built G ward the level was all wrong and that’s why the corridors don't go straight. They have to zig zag - the engineers got it wrong, in the old terms, by 1½ feet, so much for architects (laughs). But we saw a lot of developments. The old emergency ward was staffed by GPs, and then we got resident doctors, and registrar doctors. I had some very wonderful registrar doctors under my care, who were there under my care for 6 months. Tony Shakeshaft, Hung Nguyen who is a leading surgeon in Launceston and Chris O'Brien who sadly died not long ago with a brain tumour and he was a wonderful surgeon at Prince Alfred. All trained here. It was interesting to have meet those people.
(I): So how did you your work actually operate? You saw patients in the practice and in the hospital, but you weren't actually resident in the hospital?
(S): Oh no not at all. When we first came here the doctors at the hospital treated all public patients as honorary, we didn't get paid. Then Mr Whitlam changed everything in 1972. Sowe were paid by the government for treating hospital patients. We were called honorary doctors ‘til then and after that visiting specialists. You just had an arrangement with the hospital, you'd go the hospital [to] just treat public patients, but you could also put private patients in the hospital too, all hospital patients were means tested. If they were in a private fund or had a certain income above a certain level the hospital called them private and they had to pay. There's a lot of carrying on and arguing about patients, about being admitted. But we were not party to that, the hospital had to do that. There was practically no waiting lists. I never had a waiting list more than 6 weeks and neither did the other surgeons. Dr Beith, as I said was there, and Dr Gillott who was an eccentric gentlemen, who left soon after I came. And then Dr Tim Nash was there was a while, till the 80s. He was a great guy who sadly went to live in Sydney. Then we had Dr Grassby, Dr O'Connor and Dr Rice come - and Dr Grassby and Dr Rice are still at the hospital. Then I finished my practice time when I was 65 in 2002 - that's right? Yeah in 2002 I retired from medical practice - surgical practice, and became the sub-dean at the medical school.
(I): Where was your first practice?
(S): First practice was at Dr Sutherland, Dr Logan in 81 Wingewarra Street, which is next door to the RSL. What was the RSL pool is no longer, and it’s now an opticians place, I think isn't it?
(I): Yeah, Yeah…
(S): That was our practice there, and I practiced there as the GP surgeon and then I didn't do much GP at all I just did surgical related general practice. A lot of minor operations taking things off people’s faces and backs we did that in the rooms. We had a trained nurse in the rooms, steriliser and we could do these minor operations in the rooms.
(I): There weren't any specialist surgeons until about 1980. How did you manage all the patients who required some specialist surgery?
(S): Well gradually the specialist came - I was a general surgery specialist and recognised as such, and I got an Australian Fellowship then, gradually specialists came, particularly Dr Grimsdell…
(I): Yep
(S): …Orthopaedic Surgeon, and then Dr Vitharana Ear, Nose and Throat Surgeon and a great friend of mine Dr Wilson used to come up and do urology for years, years and years. He'd stay with us.
(I): So how did it work before that? If a patient needed these sort of procedures?
(S): Well as general surgeons Dr Beith and I, and Dr Grassby used to - we'd do orthopaedics, we did gynaecology, we'd all trained those things. We weren’t very specially trained. We just trained in everything in those days. I used to put nails in hips and then I'd take someone’s kidney out, and then I'd do a caesarean section. Then you'd take someone’s gallbladder out, then you'd deliver....
(I): Then you'd have lunch (laughs)
(S): Then you'd have lunch and then take someone’s uterus out. You did a bit of everything in those days.
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