Surgeon was a hero at work and at home
Many a child thinks their father is a superhero, until they grow up and realise they too are only human. However, otolaryngologist doctor Scott Stevenson really was a modern-day hero who saved lives both on and off duty.
‘‘As a child, Dad sometimes seemed like a bit of a superhero,’’ his middle child Jonathan says.
‘‘With time I’ve come to realise that everyone else actually viewed him in exactly the same way. In a crisis, he was the person that others would turn to for guidance.’’
Stevenson, a husband and father of three, was an ear, nose and throat surgeon, or otolaryngologist, at Christchurch Hospital, as well as a clinical lecturer at the Christchurch School of Medicine.
Respected by all in the business, it was his out-of-office work that was often most memorable.
In his 63 years, Stevenson came across many life-or-death incidents while on holiday, at the rugby and in perhaps his biggest test of all, the 2011 Christchurch earthquakes.
Jonathan recalls that, on one occasion, he and sister Sarah-Jayne were out for an evening run with their father when they witnessed a burglary in progress at a school.
‘‘Dad galloped after the closest offender, and after what may well have been his fastest ever 800-metre performance, he took down the thief in a textbook tackle, before restraining them in the front yard of a terrified local resident until the police arrived.’’
Not many years later, the family were on holiday at a beach in Noosa, Queensland, when Stevenson leapt up and saved a surfer who had a cardiac arrest.
‘‘Despite forgetting his glasses, Dad blindly led the successful resuscitation, with his performance even earning a mention on the 6 o’clock news.’’
He was a hero in fathering, in medicine, and teaching in his field.
However, when it came to his own wellbeing, he was a little more on the relaxed side.
Jonathan says one morning his father was sneaking downstairs to watch the All Blacks on their end-of-year European tour when he slipped and was knocked out cold.
‘‘After he finally came around, we urged him to see a doctor. Without skipping a beat he replied, ‘I’ll look in the mirror shortly.’ ’’
Best man and lifelong friend Steve Benton recalls Stevenson was the king of one-liners and dad jokes. ‘‘I hosted a dinner party. While dishing up the main course, one of us burnt the bottom of the casserole, resulting in a very heated debate as to who was to blame. Scott entered the kitchen, smelt the burnt casserole, took in the scene, went to the fridge and said ‘More wine, I think’.’’
It was his dry wit and sense of humour that kept him level-headed and grounded in a high-pressure work environment, especially after the Christchurch earthquakes.
Specialising in ear, nose and throat surgery didn’t stop him jumping to the aid of the under-pressure Christchurch Hospital staff and offering to carry out an emergency amputation.
Stevenson was a hero to wife AnnaMary Anderson too. The couple met at a high school dance when she was in the sixth form, and he in the seventh. She was a boarder at St Margaret’s College and he was a St Andrew’s College senior. They were together since that evening, and married for 38 years.
He died aged 63, as a result of a brain tumour.
Anderson describes her husband as always being a step ahead of everyone else, and never bad-tempered.
‘‘He was a proud father. He was very
otolaryngologist b December 26, 1959 d October 15, 2022
much into his work and I guess in a way, behind the scenes, I kept things going, but he was very good with the children. The kids loved him.
‘‘He was quite mild-mannered, you never saw him cross really, he could talk his way out of a situation or into a situation. He could always defuse a situation.’’
It wasn’t that work came first, but his career was his life in many ways, she says. ‘‘He was very passionate about his work and wanted everyone to be up to his standard, but of course that was never going to happen.’’
His CV shows his perfectionism paid off. He was awarded his MB from Otago University with distinction in 1982, and was awarded the Ardagh Memorial Prize from the Christchurch School of Medicine for the top student in his final year of training.
After completing a specialist fellowship in the UK, he returned to
Christchurch in the early 1990s, working for almost 30 years at Christchurch Hospital, the University of Otago, Southern Cross Hospital, St George’s Hospital and Forte Health. He became president of the New Zealand Society of Otolaryngology, and served for six years on the board.
Society of Otolaryngology president Cathy Ferguson says he was respected by all he worked with and taught. ‘‘There will be very few practising otolaryngologists in this country who have not been influenced by him as a teacher, examiner or trusted colleague.
‘‘One of my colleagues said not too long ago, ‘When I have a difficult clinical situation I still say to myself, what would Scott do?’ ’’
She reiterates that Stevenson was never off duty and always in tune with the room.
‘‘I recall an incident at an examiners’ dinner in Queenstown when one of our party experienced an oesophageal food bolus.
‘‘In typical Scott fashion, he stayed up with the colleague until the situation appeared to be resolving, no fuss, no bother, while the rest of us carried on with the dinner blissfully unaware.’’
He was the recipient of numerous awards, receiving two presidential citations from the society, in 2005 and 2019. In 2017, he was awarded the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons medal for services to surgical education.
Raised on a farm in the Awatere Valley in Marlborough, Duncan Scott Stevenson boarded at St Andrew’s, where he was dux and a member of the 1st XV. The ‘‘tall lanky lock’’ became a prouder Cantabrian than those born there.
Last but not the least, Stevenson was a great gardener and proud of his lawn, Anderson says.
‘‘He was a lawn man – he loved his lawn. It was a bit of a standing joke amongst all of his colleagues. They all have their own lawns and of course would come to the expert.’’ – By Olivia Caldwell