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Fall 2008 |
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Online Only
D O C T O R S I N
T H E N E W S
Rusted receives
key to the city
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Randy Dawe Photo |
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St. John's Mayor Dennis O'Keefe and
Dr. Nigel Rusted |
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Dr. Nigel Rusted was
presented with the Key to the City of St. John’s and what’s known as the
Freedom of the City of St. John’s at a ceremony at city hall on
September 30, 2008.
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By Jonathan Carpenter |
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Dr. Nigel Rusted was presented with
the Key to the City of St. John’s and what’s known as the Freedom of
the City of St. John’s at a ceremony at city hall on September 30,
2008. Mayor Dennis O'Keefe says the city is pleased to honor the
legacy of a medical pioneer and a man who loves his profession. Born
in Salvage, Newfoundland, in 1907, Dr. Rusted’s career began during
the summers of 1930 and 1931 as a medical student onboard the S. S.
Kyle. He was the first medical student to be the health officer
traveling along the coast of Labrador. After finishing medical
school at Dalhousie in 1933, Dr. Rusted worked as a general
practitioner for 80 communities along the southwest coast on board
the traveling medical clinic of the MV Lady Anderson qv before
opening a private practice in St. Johns. Now 101 years old, Dr.
Rusted says he performed 9000 operations before finally retiring in
1987. He had to cover 1500 of those operations himself since many
people could not afford to pay for the procedure. One of Dr.
Rusted’s most notable contributions to healthcare in the province
was his work in the reconstructive surgery of harelip and cleft
palate for hundreds of Newfoundland and Labrador children.
Dr. Rusted’s career has included such
prominent positions as: Secretary of the Newfoundland Medical
Association; Chairman of the St. John’s Clinical Society; Medical
Director, Chief of Staff and Chief of Surgery of the Grace General
Hospital; Chief of the Division of Surgery at St. John’s General
Hospital; Senior Consultant at the St. John’s General Hospital, St.
Clare’s Mercy Hospital, the Grace General Hospital and the Janeway Child
Health Centre; and the Clinical Professor of Surgery at Memorial
University of Newfoundland’s Medical School. In his 90s, he founded the
Retired Physicians Group and in 2007 he was inducted into Order of
Newfoundland and Labrador.
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