Renowned medical practitioner Dr Ramsundar Doobay dies

…hailed for contributions to medical developments in Guyana

The medical fraternity in Guyana has plunged into a state of mourning following the death of renowned cardiologist Dr Ramsundar Doobay, who died on Sunday morning at the age of 79.

Guyana Times understands that Dr Doobay had been ill for the past several months. He passed away at his Campbellville, Georgetown home.
Having started his journey in the late 1960s, Dr Doobay has had an illustrious medical career, serving the public health sector uninterrupted with brief stints, simultaneously, at various private institutions.
Dr Doobay served as Head of the Internal Medicine Department at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) for more than 50 years before he was asked to step down in 2016 under the APNU/AFC Administration.
Under his tenure there, he not only helped develop the treatment guidelines for several diseases but was also a mentor for and had trained most of Guyana’s current crop of top medical practitioners including Dr Mahendra Carpen.
Former Health Minister and current Health Advisor, Dr Leslie Ramsammy has described Dr Doobay’s passing as a great loss for Guyana and the medical fraternity.
“He was a quiet, humble guy but he served this nation to extent that he can be regarded as a national hero… His impact on the lives of many ordinary Guyanese cannot be measured.”
“We, in this country, have today lost a citizen who truly made us better… We’ve lost a true hero who made an indelible mark in medical development in Guyana,” Dr Ramsammy stated.
Meanwhile, the Board of Directors, Management and Staff of the GPHC also joined the medical fraternity in extending deepest condolences to the family, friends and loved ones of one of its best practitioners.
The hospital said, “In 1968, a young Dr Doobay begun his career at the GPHC as a medical intern. ‘Doobs’ as he was affectionately called, quickly became a household name as he treated patients, taught and mentored young practitioners and contributed to the development of medical protocols and polices in Guyana. Over the years, his alacrity and brilliance would see him ascend to the head of Internal Medicine and acting Director of Medical and Professional Services before moving on in 2016, but it was Dr Doobay’s humility and inimitable sense of humour that etched a lasting impression in the hearts and minds of those who had the honour of meeting and working with him.”
Meanwhile, in a lengthy tribute on Sunday, the Ministry of Health said very few persons have served the health sector with the same dedication, value, worth and distinction as Dr Doobay. It noted that one of the indelible images in many persons’ memories of GPHC is walking into the medicine wards and seeing a simple, unassuming Dr Doobay finding a corner of a patient’s bed to tuck himself in, sitting, talking to the patient, assuring the patient and teaching doctors.
Describing him as one of the country’s finest and most dedicated medical professionals, the Ministry said Dr Doobay is a national hero who toiled in the total absence of public attention. He began his career under the illustrious Dr Enid Denbow in November 1968 at the age of 26 and quickly began to make his mark on the medical profession and service in Guyana.
Among his early colleagues was Dr Roger Luncheon with whom he shared a personal and strong friendship and bond. By the 1970s, he had become the Head of Department of Internal Medicine. At various times, Dr Doobay also served as Medical Superintendent and acted as Director of Medical and Professional Services at the GPHC.
According to the Ministry, he is one of the few medical professionals who served the public sector throughout his career. While he served in the private sector, he never sacrificed his duty in the public sector for private practice, added to the Ministry. When he departed from the public sector in 2016, he continued serving people at the Doobay Hospital in Annandale, East Coast Demerara (ECD), a hospital founded by his cousin.
“He was brilliant. But he remained at all times a simple, humble gentleman. His sense of humour was unique. Most of his students and many patients saw a stern, serious person. But he was gentle, caring and funny. Few could tell a joke without changing their demeanour. His expressions never changed whether he was making a serious statement or making a joke. For a man who was so funny, he was also a man of few words, always cool and collective, rarely ruffled,” the Ministry said.
Outside his service to thousands of citizens whom he diagnosed and treated, he served by teaching and mentoring hundreds of young doctors as a professor at the University of Guyana (UG) School of Medicine for over three decades. He also mentored hundreds of interns at GPHC.
When Guyana introduced post-graduate training, he was one of the pillars of the post-graduate training programme. The Ministry said, “Indeed, both the internship and post-graduate internal medicine programmes benefitted from indispensable contributions from Dr Doobay. Truly, Dr Doobay moulded the career of many young and experienced doctors who today serve and who served in the past in medicine in Guyana and in many countries around the world.”
Additionally, it revealed that Dr Doobay played a major role in the early introduction of treatment guidelines for diabetes, hypertension, ischemic heart diseases, asthma, liver diseases, cancer, kidney diseases, lung diseases, neurological diseases, and various infectious diseases, such as leptospirosis, and exposure to toxic chemicals in Guyana. The Ministry noted that the elaborate guidelines that are now available to both young and experienced doctors in various areas of medicine were initially developed with considerable contributions from him.
Beginning in the 1970s and particularly at the beginning of the 21st century, Dr Doobay was instrumental in the reorganisation of medical clinics, medical wards, and the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at the GPHC. These models, the Health Ministry added, are being further improved today and are the models for hospitals across the country. Dialysis is today a routine service in Guyana, but long before dialysis was introduced, Dr Doobay introduced peritoneal dialysis in the 1970s.
According to the Ministry, without access to peritoneal dialysis in 2005 at the GPHC, dozens of people would have died from leptospirosis resulting from the big flood of 2005. In fact, Dr Doobay was the one who detected the first leptospirosis case in the country at the time.
“We will miss Dr Doobay, his invaluable lessons, his unique humour, his brilliance and intellect that mesmerised his students, colleagues, and his patients, his clinical acumen that saved lives every day for more than fifty years. His contributions to health and medicine in Guyana are unsurpassed and will live on as a legend in this country,” the Ministry added.
Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony, on behalf of the Health Ministry and the entire health sector, expressed profound sympathies to Dr Doobay’s family and friends and stands ready to support them in their loss.