Dr Martin Lowe to leave clinic

Pic: Dr Martin Lowe (right) with wife Vicky.

DOCTOR Martin Lowe has announced that he will be leaving the Yea Medical Centre after 35 years. His final day will be on April 4.

Dr Lowe commented, “I must say it doesn’t seem like 35 years. It’s been a great place to work and the working environment is great. The people I work with are great, and its always a pleasure to go to work.

“Part of what I have really enjoyed is when I started 35 years ago, I saw a generation go through, and I looked after a lot of young kids from families and now I see the next generation go through. I have seen them grown up and now I’m seeing their grandchildren. As you can imagine it makes me feel old. It is a real privilege to look after two generations in that way and getting to know the family.”

Dr Lowe grew up in Sydney and attended Kingsgrove North High School, a large, multicultural public high school.

He said, “Like most kids and teenagers, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I did well at the HSC (Higher School Certificate) and medicine was an option, so I decided to go with that and I’m very glad I made that choice. It was certainly the right career choice. I didn’t realise that at the time but later, when you start working in the field, you realise you have made the right choice.

He attended the University of New South Wales and worked at Westmead Hospital for a number of years, doing his internship and residency. He did surgical training and then decided to specialise in anaesthetics and intensive care, before making the decision to move to Yea.

Dr Lowe explained, “When I worked at Westmead, a good friend of mine was working in the emergency department at Westmead and his wife was working in the wards. They moved to Yea because their parents were living in Merrijig and they took over the [Yea] practice.

“They got busy very quickly, and they asked if I would like to come down and give them a hand. I was just about to go on an anaesthetic training scheme. I said to my friend I will come down and help you for 12 months and then I will go and finish my anaesthetic and intensive care training. And as you can see it never really happened. We just loved being in the community like Yea. My fiancé, well my wife now, we never spoke about going back to Sydney. We just loved the life in Yea.”

His plan is to take a couple of months off and look at what he wants to do. “There are a few things,” he said. “One thing as you know, in regional general practice, its always so busy and we are always understaffed. It’s always hard to get time off because of lack of locums. One of the things I hope to do, perhaps, is provide some locum coverage to relieve some doctors in the area and give them a break. There is some logistics involved but this is something I would like to try and do. I still think I would like to give back to.. Click here to continue reading the article.

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