Dear Friends,

 

Twenty years ago, I took time off from my busy practice in Belfast to study AIDs and teach student doctors in San Francisco. After the sabbatical, I published "A Measure of My Days: Journal of a Country Doctor." I promised myself that I would take another sabbatical in 7-10 years, but somehow the time got away from me...

NOW is the time. This year, we recruited 3 excellent primary care providers to join our practice (Jeff Newsom, M.D., Megan Britton, M.D., and Elizabeth Connelly, PA-C); they will cover my patients while I am away. We will not begin our major building project  - a community health center - until the fall of 2011. It is now or never.

SO... I will take 4 months off - January through April, 2011 - to write, reflect, and rest. I am not going anywhere; I will stay in Belfast. I hope to write about the changes in medicine I have witnessed and been a part of these past 3 decades in Waldo County.

In my absence, Dr. Newsom, Elizabeth Connelly, and others at Seaport Family Practice will care for you. I will make more time available for physicals before I leave and after I return. I am definitely coming back to be a part of the excitement of the new community health center. I will miss you all, but am really not going anywhere.

Thank you for your understanding, and for the trust and confidence you will place in our new colleagues. Already I look forward to my return, and to seeing you all again.

Stay healthy,

David Loxterkamp, M.D.