GYSLER o@ca.on.york_county.toronto.globe_and_mail 2003-04-30 published
Doctor gave the 'gift of life'
'Test-tube' baby expert helped introduce In Vitro Fertilization
program at the University of Toronto
By Carol COOPER
Special to The Globe and Mail Wednesday, April
30, 2003 - Page R9
Nine months ago, a long-time patient of Dr. Alan
SHEWCHUK offered
the reproductive endocrinologist and infertility specialist a
choice of pictures depicting her daughter to add to his collage
of kids' photos from grateful parents. Upon choosing one, he
flipped it over and read an inscription: "Thank you for the gift
of life."
Dr. SHEWCHUK had unknowingly made an apt choice, one that spoke
of the joy his work brought to his patients and their families.
"It was wonderful to have the experience [of having a child].
It was truly a great gift of life, "said the woman, who conceived
under Dr. SHEWCHUK's care. Her reaction was typical of those
he treated and it drove him: "They [his patients] were just so
happy and that was the kick that he got out of it, "said Valerie
SHEWCHUK, his wife of 42 years.
Dr. SHEWCHUK, who throughout his career directed the Toronto
General Hospital's reproductive biology unit, helped start the
University of Toronto's In Vitro Fertilization program, ran a
private practice, taught medical school and co-founded a private
infertility clinic -- with many activities overlapping -- died
of cancer on March 29 at the age of 66.
Known as "Big Al" to many colleagues for his tongue-in-cheek
persona of the grand old man of infertility treatment, the good-looking
doctor worked briefly as a model and worked evenings at a variety
store to pay his way through medical school.
After completing his training, Dr.
SHEWCHUK practised family
medicine in Toronto's Little Italy. There, in order to communicate
with his patients, he learned Italian, adding to the French,
German and Ukrainian he already knew. Three years later, he left
to study obstetrics and gynecology, completing his residency
in 1969. That year he became an associate staff member of Toronto
General Hospital and a clinical research fellow in what was later
named its reproductive biology unit.
Appointed a staff member at the hospital in 1972, Dr.
SHEWCHUK
attended more than 3,000 births during his career.
"He just loved delivering babies, "said his daughter Melanie,
who worked with her father for 25 years. "He said, when you pulled
out a baby, the baby was the most perfect thing in the world.
And you hand it to the parents and the parents are just elated."
witnessing the joy of birth motivated Dr.
SHEWCHUK to help those
who suffered the sorrow of infertility.
"As each decade brought new things to the field of infertility,
he kept up and tried to enhance people's fertility in the best
way he could with the tools he had at the time, "said Nancy
BRYCELAND, the nurse manager who worked with Dr.
SHEWCHUK in
the reproductive biology unit he headed from 1974 to 1988. One
of those tools was in vitro fertilization. Dr.
SHEWCHUK travelled
with colleagues to Melbourne, Australia, late in 1983 to study
the technique and
in January, 1984, was among those who began
the University of Toronto in vitro fertilization program located
at Toronto General.
On June 21 of that year, Dr.
SHEWCHUK told the Ontario Medical
Association that a Toronto woman participating in the in vitro
fertilization program was four-months pregnant, The Globe and
Mail reported. In November, 1984, the program's first baby was
born.
Dr. SHEWCHUK was born in Toronto on October 18, 1936, the middle
of three sons of a schoolteacher of Ukrainian descent and a Ukrainian
father who immigrated to Canada during the First World War. Interned
in northern Ontario for two years because of his Austro-Hungarian
citizenship, Dr.
SHEWCHUK's father later worked as a house painter
and carpenter.
Dr. SHEWCHUK was a gifted athlete who played quarterback in high-school
football and turned down the chance to pursue professional baseball.
Instead, he attended the University of Toronto medical school.
As an assistant professor with the school from 1976 to 1983,
following time as a clinical instructor and lecturer, Dr.
SHEWCHUK
demanded a lot of his students, including standards of professional
dress. The doctor, who himself wore a lab coat, required they
wear a shirt and tie in the presence of patients and sent them
home to change if they appeared otherwise.
"He was a great motivator, "said Dr. Matt
GYSLER, a former student
of Dr. SHEWCHUK's and now chief of obstetrics and gynecology
at Credit Valley Hospital in Mississauga, Ontario "He made this
area [reproductive medicine] sound interesting."
Appreciative patients brought babies and gifts of baking to his
office.
"Dr. SHEWCHUK was like a father figure to his patients, "said
Dr. Murray
KROACH, chief of obstetrics and gynecology at the
Toronto East General Hospital. "He had a presence that gave confidence
and he was motivated very strongly to expand this area of reproductive
biology."
Said one patient: "He was larger than life and had a magical
quality." She remembers how Dr.
SHEWCHUK told her that he had
slept poorly the night before her ultrasound, worrying about
the success of her pregnancy. "He balanced hope with reality,"
another said.
With a heavy workload, Dr.
SHEWCHUK reluctantly stopped delivering
babies in the late 1980s. In 1992, along with three others, Dr.
SHEWCHUK established
START, a private infertility clinic.
"Dr. SHEWCHUK was a great idea man, "said Dr. Carl
LASKIN, one
of the clinic's co-founders. "He was a real character who would
never just accept that it was just by the book. The obvious was
never the way he liked to think."
During clinical meetings when colleagues presented sound physiological
reasons for a patient's problems, Dr.
SHEWCHUK would often counter
with an "off-the-wall" explanation. "Many times he would be absolutely
wrong, "Dr.
LASKIN said, "but he pushed everyone to think differently."
Two and a half months before his death, Dr.
SHEWCHUK wrote a
letter to a married couple who had seen him. In it, he encouraged
them not to give up hope and reminded them that they could adopt.
They would make wonderful parents. And he said that people like
them were the reason he came to work. They had given him joy,
said the man who himself brought joy to so many.
Dr. SHEWCHUK leaves his wife
Valerie and children Melanie, Leslie
and Alan.
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