GRATEFUL: Gary and Phillis Haynes outside their Buladelah home. Picture: Daniel Mills
PHILLIS Haynes owes her life to outgoing Buladelah doctor Adel Habashy.
The 77 year old who has lived her whole life in Buladelah spent one-week linked up to a life support monitor after she was rushed to hospital with a life-threatening pancreatic condition.
The whole time, her husband Gary said, Dr Habashy was there alongside her.
"When Phillis got sick with pancreatitis he knew the condition straight away," Mr Haynes told the Nota.
"He is a very skillful doctor who could perform any procedure."
Between the hospital, nursing home and doctor's surgery the pair said Dr Habashy was the mainstay of the townspeople's health, providing unwavering support for those that needed it most.
"If it wasn't for him I wouldn't be alive today," Mrs Haynes said.
"It's a shame things have worked out the way they have."
Having performed surgery on the pair countless times, including the removal of skin cancers, Mr Haynes said it would be hard to ever find a doctor which could effectively replicate the skills of Dr Habashy's.
"I don't think if you went to any little country town you would find a doctor as capable," he said.
Bulahdelah has been without a full-time GP and visiting medical officer for the Bulahdelah Hospital for more than nine months since Dr Habashy went on sick leave.
Some way it is still unclear as to the circumstances surrounding his return as a practising professional.
"I will regularly visit Bulahdelah, perhaps in a professional capacity as my health permits, but always as a friend, and a local," he wrote in a recent letter published by the Nota.
