A Personal Doctor
Treva Brown has always been touched by Dr. Joyce Madigane’s personal touch.
Take the birth of Brown’s first child.
Brown, 49, of Bayside recalls fondly how Madigane offered soothing preparation for the delivery well above the call of duty as the doctor sat with Brown and her husband for more than two hours before it was time to go into the delivery room.
“She was just kind of rubbing my leg and just being like a mother to me,’’ said Brown.
“She was just there the whole time and it was a great comfort.’’
Patients lavish praise on Madigane for the professional and personable care she has provided to the people of Tyne Valley and surrounding area for more than 35 years.
Brown says Madigane, who delivered all but one of her nine children, always takes lots of time with her patients.
“She’s not trying to just do the medicine and get you out of the door sort of thing,’’ she said.
“She always wants to know how you are doing. So she is very much a personal doctor.’’
Ironically, while Madigane is known for not rushing a patient out of an examining room, she could have been here and gone in a near blink of an eye.
The province recruited the Zimbabwe-born Madigane to leave her practice in England to work in Tyne Valley in 1974. She was coaxed into giving the job a shot for six months. If she didn’t like it, her plane ticket back to England would be paid for.
She arrived to a chaotic situation. The Stewart Memorial Hospital was closed and “there was so much controversy going on.’’
Yet she was assured all would be okay.
There would be plenty of rural care upheaval ahead in this western community, but Madigane was determined to fight for the local health care cause as she quickly became devoted to caring for the people here.
“I am here because of the people,’’ she said in a lengthy interview with The Guardian.
“The people when I came here were so welcoming. They were so nice.’’
Some, though, were shocked at first that a black doctor was now their doctor. They fought among themselves, never confronting her, she recalls.
One day, she went to the home of a man who was quite ill. She looked after him and jumped in the ambulance with the man as he was taken to hospital.
Madigane says she didn’t know at the time that the man was one of the people that had been saying ‘no black doctor.’
“But the neighbours knew and they gathered around to watch him and afterwards they told me that ‘we watched him and you were holding his hand and he didn’t resist and he was holding your hand too,’’’ she said with a big smile.
The man’s wife became one of her best friends.
“This is home, this is family,’’ said Madigane, who lives just outside Tyne Valley in Bideford.
“It is my medical family and it is also my family...the people here are just wonderful and when people trust you, you don’t want to let them down. And that is what drives me. And I can’t afford to let Tyne Valley down.’’
Madigane has been nominated a finalist and potential winner of the Canadian Immigrant’s Top 25 Canadian Immigrants Awards for 2010 in part for her reputation as a fierce health advocate who has been a staunch defender of Island rural hospitals while displaying unwavering commitment to excellent health care.
She calls the Tyne Valley Health Centre, which opened last year, a victory for the community as well as for democracy.
“It was the Conservatives, it was the Liberals, it was the community working together to see that we have a beautiful, modern clinic,’’ she said.
“I’m very proud that this legacy is here.’’
Madigane, who describes herself as a nighthawk and not a morning person, sees patients at the clinic twice a week, commonly from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m.
On Wednesdays, she makes the short 10-minute drive to Lennox Island to see aboriginal patients living on the reserve.
She recalls dismissing the concerns of her colleagues in Summerside at her decision years ago to become the first doctor to go to Lennox Island, rather than continue the practice of the residents of the reserve coming in to Tyne Valley to see a doctor.
“I laughed. I said ‘no, I’ll go there. On Lennox Island, people don’t beat strangers. They fight among themselves. They don’t fight strangers. They were very friendly and very receptive.’’
Misti Myers says she and her fellow band members heartily embrace the doctor.
“She is a part of so many lives there,’’ said Myers.
Madigane performed the delivery to bring Myers into the world and went on to deliver Myers’ three children.
“When I had my babies I was really, really glad she was there,’’ said Myers.
“She has like nicknames for all of my babies and they are like her babies. She’s kind of like my mom.’’
Madigane says she was only nine when she decided she was going to be a doctor. She would line up her classmates for mock check-ups.
School came easy. She was always top of her class. And her parents were very determined that she would receive a good education.
She got her medical degree in England in 1969, working in the country mainly in obstetrics and gynecology, before deciding to come to Canada five years later.
Her two children - Nontuthuzelo Majola and Jongilizwe Majola - joined her two years later. Her husband Seaton Majola, though, stayed behind with the liberation movement and died in Cape Town, South Africa during the apartheid era.
Madigane won’t detail any of the upheaval in her past, but notes she has spent years speaking out against the strife of her people in Zimbabwe.
For years, she would return to her homeland for stretches of four to six weeks to assist in mission clinics but now she fears a return home would be too risky for her personal safety.
“I believe God brought me here (to Canada) to be safe so that I could speak out,’’ she said.
Madigane has bought and sent loads of clothes to mission schools in Zimbabwe and has also financed the university education of a handful of members of her extended family.
“In Zimbabwe, everybody knew who Dr. Madigane was because I was the first girl doctor,’’ she said.
“You have a sense that you have to be a role model and I was disappointed that I could not practice in my own country.’’
Noreen Millar, medical assistant to Madigane ever since the doctor arrived in Tyne Valley, says Zimbabwe’s loss has certainly been Prince Edward Island’s gain.
“Well, she’s been a very dedicated doctor - very kind, very passionate,’’ said Millar.
“And if anything is going on with a family, she is right there behind them all the way. She’s a great doctor in Tyne Valley.’’
June Adams, 81, of Tyne Valley says everyone in the community loves Madigane.
“We were all lost when she went away (to visit her ill daughter in England) and all you have to do is look when she got back, the parking lots are full of cars for her,’’ she said.
“The other doctors were good when she was gone but it’s not the same as having Dr. Madigane.’’
- The Guardian
Take the birth of Brown’s first child.
Brown, 49, of Bayside recalls fondly how Madigane offered soothing preparation for the delivery well above the call of duty as the doctor sat with Brown and her husband for more than two hours before it was time to go into the delivery room.
“She was just kind of rubbing my leg and just being like a mother to me,’’ said Brown.
“She was just there the whole time and it was a great comfort.’’
Patients lavish praise on Madigane for the professional and personable care she has provided to the people of Tyne Valley and surrounding area for more than 35 years.
Brown says Madigane, who delivered all but one of her nine children, always takes lots of time with her patients.
“She’s not trying to just do the medicine and get you out of the door sort of thing,’’ she said.
“She always wants to know how you are doing. So she is very much a personal doctor.’’
Ironically, while Madigane is known for not rushing a patient out of an examining room, she could have been here and gone in a near blink of an eye.
The province recruited the Zimbabwe-born Madigane to leave her practice in England to work in Tyne Valley in 1974. She was coaxed into giving the job a shot for six months. If she didn’t like it, her plane ticket back to England would be paid for.
She arrived to a chaotic situation. The Stewart Memorial Hospital was closed and “there was so much controversy going on.’’
Yet she was assured all would be okay.
There would be plenty of rural care upheaval ahead in this western community, but Madigane was determined to fight for the local health care cause as she quickly became devoted to caring for the people here.
“I am here because of the people,’’ she said in a lengthy interview with The Guardian.
“The people when I came here were so welcoming. They were so nice.’’
Some, though, were shocked at first that a black doctor was now their doctor. They fought among themselves, never confronting her, she recalls.
One day, she went to the home of a man who was quite ill. She looked after him and jumped in the ambulance with the man as he was taken to hospital.
Madigane says she didn’t know at the time that the man was one of the people that had been saying ‘no black doctor.’
“But the neighbours knew and they gathered around to watch him and afterwards they told me that ‘we watched him and you were holding his hand and he didn’t resist and he was holding your hand too,’’’ she said with a big smile.
The man’s wife became one of her best friends.
“This is home, this is family,’’ said Madigane, who lives just outside Tyne Valley in Bideford.
“It is my medical family and it is also my family...the people here are just wonderful and when people trust you, you don’t want to let them down. And that is what drives me. And I can’t afford to let Tyne Valley down.’’
Madigane has been nominated a finalist and potential winner of the Canadian Immigrant’s Top 25 Canadian Immigrants Awards for 2010 in part for her reputation as a fierce health advocate who has been a staunch defender of Island rural hospitals while displaying unwavering commitment to excellent health care.
She calls the Tyne Valley Health Centre, which opened last year, a victory for the community as well as for democracy.
“It was the Conservatives, it was the Liberals, it was the community working together to see that we have a beautiful, modern clinic,’’ she said.
“I’m very proud that this legacy is here.’’
Madigane, who describes herself as a nighthawk and not a morning person, sees patients at the clinic twice a week, commonly from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m.
On Wednesdays, she makes the short 10-minute drive to Lennox Island to see aboriginal patients living on the reserve.
She recalls dismissing the concerns of her colleagues in Summerside at her decision years ago to become the first doctor to go to Lennox Island, rather than continue the practice of the residents of the reserve coming in to Tyne Valley to see a doctor.
“I laughed. I said ‘no, I’ll go there. On Lennox Island, people don’t beat strangers. They fight among themselves. They don’t fight strangers. They were very friendly and very receptive.’’
Misti Myers says she and her fellow band members heartily embrace the doctor.
“She is a part of so many lives there,’’ said Myers.
Madigane performed the delivery to bring Myers into the world and went on to deliver Myers’ three children.
“When I had my babies I was really, really glad she was there,’’ said Myers.
“She has like nicknames for all of my babies and they are like her babies. She’s kind of like my mom.’’
Madigane says she was only nine when she decided she was going to be a doctor. She would line up her classmates for mock check-ups.
School came easy. She was always top of her class. And her parents were very determined that she would receive a good education.
She got her medical degree in England in 1969, working in the country mainly in obstetrics and gynecology, before deciding to come to Canada five years later.
Her two children - Nontuthuzelo Majola and Jongilizwe Majola - joined her two years later. Her husband Seaton Majola, though, stayed behind with the liberation movement and died in Cape Town, South Africa during the apartheid era.
Madigane won’t detail any of the upheaval in her past, but notes she has spent years speaking out against the strife of her people in Zimbabwe.
For years, she would return to her homeland for stretches of four to six weeks to assist in mission clinics but now she fears a return home would be too risky for her personal safety.
“I believe God brought me here (to Canada) to be safe so that I could speak out,’’ she said.
Madigane has bought and sent loads of clothes to mission schools in Zimbabwe and has also financed the university education of a handful of members of her extended family.
“In Zimbabwe, everybody knew who Dr. Madigane was because I was the first girl doctor,’’ she said.
“You have a sense that you have to be a role model and I was disappointed that I could not practice in my own country.’’
Noreen Millar, medical assistant to Madigane ever since the doctor arrived in Tyne Valley, says Zimbabwe’s loss has certainly been Prince Edward Island’s gain.
“Well, she’s been a very dedicated doctor - very kind, very passionate,’’ said Millar.
“And if anything is going on with a family, she is right there behind them all the way. She’s a great doctor in Tyne Valley.’’
June Adams, 81, of Tyne Valley says everyone in the community loves Madigane.
“We were all lost when she went away (to visit her ill daughter in England) and all you have to do is look when she got back, the parking lots are full of cars for her,’’ she said.
“The other doctors were good when she was gone but it’s not the same as having Dr. Madigane.’’
- The Guardian