A new doctor is ready to start caring for the Noosa community after making the move from Melbourne into a Sunshine Coast home she had only seen online after hotel quarantine in Brisbane.
Dr Nadia Messerschmidt is now seeing patients at the Ochre Medical Centres in Noosa and Eumundi, but her road here has been a story in itself.
“I came to Australia when I was 24,” the South African-born doctor said.
“Back then I was a software programmer and I had just married my husband. I worked on a big redevelopment of the Lonely Planet website, which aligned well with my love of travelling.
“I then did my honors degree in bioinformatics, studying software used to determine whether the DNA from a particular individual contains mutations. During that course, I became increasingly interested in biology, so it seemed logical to enroll in medicine when I finished.“
Dr Messerschmidt found her calling as a GP.
“I like both the people side and the procedural side – I did Emergency work as part of my training, which I loved for the variety.”
And variety is exactly what maintains her passion.
“Each day is different: it keeps me on my toes. There are always new challenges, and it’s rewarding to focus on the patient as whole person rather than one organ or one system.”
Dr Messerschmidt may be a new face at the Ochre Health practices on the Coast, but her family already had strong links with the company.
“After my husband and I had moved to Melbourne, his parents came to visit us and they too fell in love with Australia. My father-in-law, who is a GP, started looking into work opportunities and he was recruited by the then fledgling Ochre Health. His name is Dr Mieke Messerschmidt and he was one of the first doctors to join the company in its first practice in Bourke, before moving to a major new Ochre Health clinic in Grafton. He retired in 2018 and, still in the Grafton area, both he and my mother-in-law are enjoying life and growing orchids.”
Given the family connection, it was only natural for Dr Messerschmidt to contact Ochre Health to make her own move.
She is delighted with the continuity and quality of patient care she is able to provide under Ochre Health’s management framework, which has been built on the company’s rural heritage.
