CARLYLE - There have been a lot of changes to health care over the decades, but in southeast Saskatchewan, the psychiatry world has seen years of stability.
Since 1992, Dr. Donald K. MacRae has been practising in Carlyle.
MacRae and wife Lorine have lived a storied life. MacRae graduated from Luther College in Regina in 1954 and in 1955 met the love of his life at the University of Saskatoon. Lorine was both a registered nurse and a psychiatric nurse. He enrolled in theology at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver in 1956 and graduated with a bachelor of divinity in 1961.
That year, MacRae was ordained as a United Church minister. He moved to Broadview and conducted local Sunday services in the area. His annual minister’s salary was $3,600.
After a couple of years, MacRae decided to return to school and attended the U of S in Saskatoon. He really wanted to become a doctor, but not just a general practitioner. He was always fascinated with the workings of the human mind.
After many more years of studies, MacRae graduated and became a psychiatrist. Unlike a psychologist, a psychiatrist is a medical doctor that can prescribe medicine, diagnose illness, and treat complex conditions such as severe depression, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. It is one of the world’s most demanding professions.
To this day, MacRae continues to chart his own notes on every patient without the use of a dictaphone or an office assistant.
MacRae started practising in Regina in the early 1970s. In 1992, the MacRaes decided to move home to Carlyle. They purchased the old SaskPower building beside CIBC on Main Street and he set up his practice with wife Lorine as office manager.
MacRae retired and sold the building in 2009 but he wasn’t done yet. The provincial government could not find any psychiatrists willing to travel out of the city, so they convinced him to return to practice and he was reinstated. MacRae started seeing patients in the Carlyle Medical Clinic building.
Due to advancing age, MacRae decided to reduce his workload. In 2017, he was diagnosed with life-threatening bladder cancer. Both the bladder and his prostate were successfully removed. Dr. MacRae slowed down for a grand total of 90 days and was back to work.
In addition to phone appointments, MacRae also sees patients in person at his rural residence located eight kilometres northeast of Carlyle. He and Lorine live less than 1,000 metres from White Bear First Nations land and less than 1,000 metres from where his grandfather homesteaded.
The White Bear First Nations have played an important part in the family’s history. His grandfather, Alexander MacRae, was one of the earliest settlers in the Carlyle area, homesteading in 1882. He once said, “If it were not for the Indigenous people on White Bear we would not have survived.”
Earlier this month, he had a nonagenarian patient visit him for the umpteenth time. He has named Dr. MacRae’s rural practice Tranquility Place.
The MacRaes have three children, Tannis, Cecilia and Keith. Their daughters are rare Irish twins. They also have seven grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.
Moving back to Carlyle 30 years ago is one of the highlights of MacRae’s illustrious career.
“We love the farm; we love our family and we love the area. We wouldn’t change our lives for anything. And, come November, I am indeed officially retiring”, said MacRae with a smile.
