Assumption Joseph de Mello was elevated to Emeritus Status by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario

on his retirement after 50 years of medical practice on June 1, 2022.

Throughout my days at school I knew that I wanted to become a doctor. And my dear parents always encouraged me in this direction. My role model at the time was our family doctor Dr. Peter De Sousa, son of the renowned Dr. A.C.L. De Sousa, one of the founders of the school. Whenever I went to see him as a patient I was always impressed with his caring and thorough approach to my problem and his reassuring bedside manner. He also was an impeccable dresser and always washed his hands with soap and water after examining a patient – a ritual all too often forgotten or ignored by the modern medical fraternity.

I always wanted to be a Family Doctor and when I graduated in London in 1967 I returned for a brief sojourn to Nairobi. It was my hope that I would be able to intern in one of the hospitals there, and eventually enter General Practice or Family Practice as it is euphemistically termed to-day. To my chagrin and disappointment, I was advised by 2 African Medical Consultants and some of my late Dad’s senior civil service colleagues that Kenya was no longer a place for Asians and that I should plan to make a career elsewhere. So much for my plans to practice medicine in Kenya

I enjoyed my short reunion with my parents and with some reluctance boarded the flight back to London. There I completed my internship at King’s College Hospital and one year as Casualty Officer at Charing Cross Hospital. During that time some career decisions had to be made. I did not particularly care to stay and work in the National Health Service in Britain. After a few “locum tenens” - substituting for doctors on holiday, I quickly realized that work as a General Practitioner (an older term for Family Doctor) reduced me to the status of a glorified clerk working in a “surgery” armed with a prescription pad and a ball point pen Anything more serious than routine problems were referred to the Casualty Department of the local hospital and the patient was lost to follow up. Australia or Canada then became serious considerations as places for settlement. At that time I was also offered a job as a Ship’s Doctor with the P&O Steamship Company sailing to and from Australia and New Zealand but declined. I had heard that Canada had begun accepting non-white immigrants and was a more tolerant and compassionate society. As it happened, I kept in touch with the Dean of our Medical School, Dr. Douglas Bilbey, who by now had emigrated to Canada. He had set up a clinic in the interior of British Columbia at a place called 100 Mile House and invited me to join him. On closer examination I found out it was a 1 horse lumber town miles away from any major urban centres. Because of this I had to decline his kind offer. After several more unsuccessful attempts to locate a practice, I eventually took the chance of crossing the pond and arrived in Toronto in October of 1969 – not knowing a soul! I originally planned to travel to Vancouver and already had a rail ticket. However, when I realized that I would have to travel about the same distance again to reach the west coast, I quickly abandoned that idea and decided to settle for Toronto.

After passing my Canadian qualifying exams, I opened my own practice in a modern professional building on the Lakeshore in 1972. Family Practice in Canada was much more comprehensive at that time. One could admit and look after patients in hospital, work in the Emergency Department, perform minor procedures and do Obstetrics. The downside of this situation was that one would have to be on call round the clock. As the years went by I was fortunate to develop professional and business relationships with some very affable and astute family physicians in the area. Our medical group turned out to be truly international – 3 Filipinos, 1 Asian from Uganda, 1 Anglo-Saxon Canadian, 1 Chinese Malaysian and myself from Kenya. Together, in 1990, we put together the Lakeshore West Medical Professional Centre – a premier full service medical centre comprising a Pharmacy, Laboratory, Radiology, Optician, Physiotherapy and Specialist Centre. We also embarked on a separate venture - the Lakeshore Village Walk-In Clinic which was staffed by some 20 family doctors to care for patients outside office hours. Both were challenging undertakings, and great learning experiences in the real estate development and business fields.

The Board Room in our medical centre was a focus of great interest. In 1995 it saw the introduction of the Internet to the Goan Community thanks largely to the efforts of my brother Tim and John D’Souza. It had also become the forum of Continuing Medical Education. For about 16 years we organized weekly medical seminars for family doctors in the West End of Toronto. Through these sessions we were able to keep current in our medical practices.

General practice gave me the chance to know the whole patient and his family which in many instances included several generations. We shared moments of joy and sadness. The practice was challenging, satisfying and enjoyable. However, malpractice issues began surfacing for physicians and insurance premiums began to increase. The net result was that family doctors like myself stopped doing Obstetrics and other invasive procedures. As a result the number of infants I saw and followed through to their teens dropped off. They were referred to Pediatric specialists at birth. The age of my patient base increased and with it came more of the problems of the aging. I undertook only minor surgical procedures but I did assist surgeons on major procedures. Patients and families expected and appreciated this. It seemed to give them a feeling of security and confidence to know their family physician was present at the time of surgery and somehow assured continuity of care. The development and increasing use of minimally invasive procedures such as laparoscopic surgery made an assistant surgeon superfluous. Some in our group learned to do Sclerotherapy which is the injection of varicose and spider veins. With some of the group we also undertook the study of Refraction which is eye examination for the purpose of prescribing eye glasses. This was because the Optician as a condition of his lease in our new medical centre wanted some family physicians to perform Eye Examinations for him. I also learnt to do Acupuncture for Smoking Cessation. At about that time I was fortunate to be appointed Medical Examiner to Citizenship and Immigration Canada and to the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board of Ontario. All this gave me new perspectives and became an integral and interesting aspect of my medical practice.

I enjoy writing, so in between caring for patients, playing squash,tennis, and fishing, I somehow found time to turn out medical and travel articles for such publications as Doctors Review, Medical Post, and HealthWatch which was a Shoppers Drug Mart publication. I found this stimulating and rewarding work.

Patients at my office were seen by appointment, but emergencies were always accommodated. A concerned patient was not required to wait anxiously for an appointment sometime in the future. Sometimes in-office waiting time was prolonged but there were few complaints. Those with acute illnesses or significant injuries were seen without waiting. Those needing only a routine immunization or allergy shot were seen by Angie, my Registered Nurse on staff. When possible, phone calls were returned between patients. No one enjoys waiting and worrying all day for a return phone call.

While doing my medical training in London, we were expected to dress like doctors and that habit has remained with me throughout my practice – the uniform of the day was slacks, shirt,tie and white coat. And I always remembered, a la Dr. Peter De Sousa, to wash my hands with soap and water after examining every patient.

Developments in the field of medicine have grown by leaps and bounds, and each body part belongs to different specialist or sub-specialist. I don’t think one doctor can give total care anymore. With the acute shortage of primary care physicians and the proliferation of Walk-In Clinics, I have the impression that the interaction between physician and patient is less caring and the relationship is often adversarial. So it requires physicians to cover all bases including being on their best behaviour when attending patients.

I left full time medical practice in November 2006 with the feeling that I had developed a strong physician-patient relationship based on caring, compassion, and trust. I still live in the community where I practiced, and now I think of my former patients (who came from the four corners of the earth) as friends, when I meet them in the shopping mall or the supermarket. I often think of my patients’ appreciation and generosity throughout my 35 year career, tomatoes and zucchini from my Italian patients’ gardens, leather goods from my Chilean patients when they visited the old country, etc. Then there was Father Vettical, the Catholic priest visiting from Kerala, India who attended my office for an Immigration Medical Examination which I performed gratis. A year later I received a nice letter from him remembering his visit to my office and advising me that he was now working at the Vatican Secretariat enclosing a Papal Blessing and a photo of himself and the late Pope John Paul II. What a wonderful token of remembrance which I shall always revere and cherish. I will also always fondly recall Christmas time when the office took on a festive appearance with hundreds of cards, red ribbons and bows, poinsettia plants, numerous boxes of chocolates, bottles and bottles of liquor and wine etc. I could have opened a store! One patient from the east coast regularly baked Christmas cake for me and Joanne ,my secretary with a unique twist. Along with the regular cake mix, her secret ingredient was Campbell’s Tomato Soup which gave it a wonderfully moist texture!! I miss all this kindness.

I continued to work part-time in a Walk-In Clinic until my retirement. Here I saw several of my old patients on an episodic basis.

I would be remiss if through this entire account I did not mention my dear wife Madeline who made sure that everything ran smoothly for me. On looking back, it is a good feeling to know I made a small contribution to mankind and also made a graceful exit, still maintaining the respect, gratitude, and appreciation of my patients and of my colleagues.

Below: GOA Founder Members Award Lunch (May 25, 2022)