The Doc's Side: Tales of a Sunshine Coast Doctor

by Eric Paetkau

In September of 1959, freshly minted physician Eric Paetkau and his new bride travelled the narrow, winding road on BC's Sunshine Coast. The road suddenly ended at a twin-gabled, two-storey building perched on a bluff overlooking picturesque ocean bays dotted with islands. The young doctor gazed up at St. Mary's Hospital and thought, "this is for me."

Paetkau's humorous and sometimes harrowing stories of his career in this rugged place begin at a time when the doctor often travelled by car, boat or seaplane to patients in remote homes and logging camps. Paetkau recalls those early days when he was confronted with an unusual situation, his partner advised him to "just wing it." When he told a patient that he wasn't trained to extract his bad tooth, the man replied, "the doctors here pull teeth." Before he knew it, the new doctor found himself administering to the offending teeth of both man and beast. In fact, veterinary care was another hat that he would learn to wear in his new position. Paetkau recollects the unique characters who inhabited his community--the female trapper suffering from a "peculiar" stomach (she was seven months pregnant), to the logger with a deep cut on his forehead who refused anaesthetic because he wanted his twelve-year-old son "to see how a tough man handles a thing like this."

Paetkau's career began in a frontier age of medicine in British Columbia, when patients' expectations were pragmatic, physicians had more autonomy and community support was enormous. As time passed, the local doctor was motivated to explore politics as a way to meaningfully improve his community while facing increasing challenges brought on by bureaucratic upheavals and physician shortages. After witnessing many tragedies, some miraculous outcomes and accumulating a physician's bag of engaging stories, Dr. Eric Paetkau officially retired in June 2002, but kept on doing locums for the next nine years.

224 pages, Paperback

First published October 27, 2011

Reviews

[Karin · Rating 2 out of 5]

This author is a born story teller and has done a great job of recording how medicine changed dramatically over his years or practice, apparently you need to take his personal anecdotes about family & friends with a large grain of salt. In addition, he is a surgeon, and like many surgeons, he has a huge ego. While not as extremely racist or sexist as many of his contemporaries, there is no question that he leaned that way.

[Pam · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is part a class in advance of The Writers' Festival. I found it rather rambling, more like musings of an older person. There was some interesting historical insights and facts of the region. Definitely a book of interest to locals rather than a wider audience.

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 1/2 stars. I did like it; the book is essentially a telling of his memoirs and so best to read this with the mindset of “short story” for the episodic memories he recounts. Paetkau is a good story teller and good writer, and lived an interesting life. I had to knock a few stars off for the sexist/racist/androcentric/self-aggrandizing undertones; however, while some of the stories are a bit cringe-worthy, he is a man reflecting the political and social norms experienced in the prime of his life.

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked up this book at a bookstore in Sechelt in the summer and finally got around to reading it.
I picked it because it had a Mennonite name (of interest to me) and was a memoir about the area where I was staying.

This is a story about Eric and his life living in Sechelt area as a doctor during the 60's to his retirement in 2012. While chronological, it was filled with stories of his interesting patients and his involvement in their treatments, etc. I thoroughly enjoyed this book as it was well written and didn't seem to have filler content nor was it dry.

[Caroline Mcphail-Lambert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very readable look back in time of a Doctor's life and career on the West Coast.

[Storm Bay · Rating 3 out of 5]

While Eric Paetkau is a born story teller, this book is useful only as a history of the changes of medicine in rural BC, as those are accurate. As with most memoirs, all stories of friends and family need to be taken with a huge grain of salt. Bear in mind that he was a surgeon, so has a bit of that "God complex" and isn't exactly politically correct.