The very idea of a country doctor—someone out in the back blocks, attending to births, farming accidents, and people in need in isolated valleys, on notice night and day to drive through metal roads to cure and give comfort—is one of the foundation myths of New Zealand life. It remains in place, judging by the massive response to a contest to win the newly published memoir A Place To Stand by Dr Clare Ward, who has worked as a GP these past 30 years in remote, beautiful, vulnerable Hokianga.
Readers wishing to enter the contest were required to share a story about rural doctoring or nursing in the provinces. Dozens of such stories poured in.
A leading contendor to win a copy of A Place to Stand is Patricia Smith, who wrote, “I have an interest in Dr Clare’s experiences as a doctor in Rawene because of a very loose connection I have with the famous, eccentric, Scottish-trained Dr GM Smith who set up the Hokianga Medical Area in 1941, providing free, state-funded healthcare to the remote rural community.
“In the early 1940s my father was the sole teacher at Taheke primary school, not far from Rawene. Because there were few roads in the Hokianga, medical treatment was difficult to access, and district nurses and doctors made their house calls either by boat or by horse. One of Dr Smith’s initiatives was to set up certain trusted people in various settlements with medical kits. The idea was to give initial first aid and then get the patient as quickly as possible to the hospital. My father was one of those ‘first responders’ and had one of those kits. It was actually a sealed 3lb tin of sterilised dressings, bandages and drugs for pain, complete with full instructions.
“I know my father had at least one serious emergency to deal with. A local young Māori woman was brought to him after an accident in the cowshed. Her hair had become caught in the milking machine and part (or was it all?) of her scalp was torn off. The skin and hair for some reason had been buried (tapu I guess), and my father, having dealt as best he could with what must have been a terrible wound, retrieved the buried scalp and arranged for her to be taken to Rawene Hospital.
“To my father, Dr Smith was somewhat of an idol or hero. He was a progressive doctor and introduced innovations such as having nurses gowned, masked and gloves to prevent cross infection and the use of Nembutal for painless childbirth. His cure-all for wounds and burns was a dressing of cod liver oil and Vaseline. The influence of Dr Smith still reached me years later even after we left the area. I had a cut on my leg that my father treated with the ubiquitous cod liver oil and Vaseline dressing and it healed well.”
Jacquie De Boer, too, can testify to country health services in Northland. “I had my two children in Northland—including the home birth of my second (11 pound 4 ounce) baby—a record weight for a home birth for my midwife at the time, and an hour from the nearest hospital. Rural doctors like Clare are amazing and Northland is an incredible community to be a part of.”
Kathy Watson reported on her experiences in the other island. “Akaroa is close to my heart as my Dad was raised on the peninsula. As my parents aged, Dad continued farming into his 90s. He rolled his 4 wheeler, he cut his hand blade shearing, he fell down a bank saving a ewe…the list goes on. The patient, personal doctoring kept him going. My mother had a stroke at 62, but the local doctors supported her into her 80s. This is rural doctoring, 24-hour, personal and kind, the backbone of a community.”
And there was this report from Hawkes Bay, by Valerie Watson: “My mother was a dental nurse, and boarded with a woman she called Nurse Banks in Wairoa in the 1940s. Mum adored Nursey and often talked about how Nurse Banks would be called out at all hours of the day and night, in all weathers. Nursey would saddle up her large placid mare and attend everything from births to accidents. True dedication to the community she served. In her last years I asked Mum what the happiest time of her life was. ‘Wairoa’, she replied.”
There was also a fascinating entry from prolific Newsroom commentator Dr Peter Davis. He wrote that he taught first year sociology at the Auckland Medical School in the late 1970s and 1980s: “Clare was a student of mine in that early period. Despite being in a class of 100, she stood out. It was always a difficult class to teach because the students were impatient to get their hands on patients and I was not exactly a charismatic teacher. Sociology was a hard sell. But there was always a good five per cent of the class who were onto it. And Clare was one of them. So was Hinemoa Elder, who led a round of applause at the end of one my lectures. What a godsend that was; thank you Hinemoa!
“Clare stood out not just because she took an interest in the topic, but because she showed quiet, empathic, values-based leadership qualities, somewhat on the Ardern style. As with almost all the students, I lost track of her after she graduated and I often wondered where she might have ended up. Maybe Australia? Far too many go there. But no, Rawene. She went off my radar after graduation, but I would like her back on my radar screen and it looks like her book will help me do that.”
Cheers to everyone else who entered. A winner will be announced in ReadingRoom on Friday.
A Place to Stand by Clare Ward (Allen & Unwin, $37.99) is available in bookstores nationwide.
