Practice changes

John is finding there is a life outside of his passion for his career and fascination with medicine.

John has decided to step back from his full-time practice after the 1st of July. His rooms will still be making appointments, sometimes with the phone diverted, so that he can continue work on a part time basis.  He has been and continues to look for someone to share and eventually take over his rooms in North West Specialist Centre Flockton St, Everton Park.

John will now only be consulting in his rooms on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

He will stop delivering babies on 31st December, 2022.The time has come for him to rationalize the amount and type of work he performs to achieve a more balanced work life. He will continue to bulk bill pensioners, health care holders, student card holders and anyone who is suffering personal/ financial hardship. Bulk billing the Medicare rebate mostly does not cover costs. However, in his kind and gentle manner, John believes that he is contributing towards the greater good. He refuses to use the Americanism of “giving back”.

Don’t get him started, he can tell some very wicked jokes about this saying. He does not talk about any of his volunteer work. He is also enjoying the opportunities for teaching medical students. John intends to continue to care for Obstetric Patients from the public system. He will hand over care of his privately insured patients to his Wesley colleagues if the patients are planning a vaginal delivery.

He will continue to care for and deliver his Obstetric patients with planned caesarean deliveries.

John will continue to provide gynaecological consultations and some telehealth consultations for ongoing problems. He will also continue to perform colposcopies and Lletz treatments in rooms, along with Lichen sclerosis treatments, insertion and checking of vaginal pessaries and rings. Mona Lisa Laser treatment for post-menopausal and breast cancer patients with vaginal atrophy will also still be available. Steroid resistant Lichen sclerosis also responds to the Mona Lisa laser, as it appears to enhance the steroid’s effects.

The insertion and removal of IUCD’s, Implanon and hormone replacement implants, will also continue as will his diagnostic ultrasounds in his rooms. The gynae operations he will mostly only be doing are day cases such as extensive Lletz treatment, hysteroscopies, endometrial ablations, diagnostic laparoscopies and salpingectomies.

John remains fully committed to his patients and, can always be contacted in an emergency on his mobile.

He has Dr Tronc and other Wesley doctors covering him and his patients if he is out of Brisbane. After living in an isolationist Covid bubble for over 2 years without any substantial time off and very limited social engagement, he is really enjoying visiting other hospitals on a 2 weeks or less, locum basis, while still maintaining a covid bubble. This form of busman’s holiday is sometimes referred to as a Specialist’s “Gap Year” although John’s wife is going with him.

A number of Brisbane based Specialists are working in places like Burnie, Mildura, Kalgoorlie, Broken Hill, Gove and Darwin to help maintain services in remote areas.

Sue Howland