Glenda Powell AM (Machin, 1955)
Queensland's first geriatrician
As a trainee doctor in the early 1960s, Glenda Powell was posted to the new Geriatric Unit of the Princess Alexandra Hospital thinking: `Oh well, I’ll work for a few weeks, then I’ll resign because I know I’ll hate it.’
Instead, she went on to become Queensland’s first female geriatrician and in 2002 was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for her outstanding contribution to aged care across a career defined by inclusivity and advocacy.
Throughout a six-decade working life, Glenda has seen geriatrics progress from an almost unknown (and often derided) field, to one of the most in-demand medical specialities.
And she fell into it quite by accident. `I always say geriatrics found me. I didn’t find it,’ she says.
Glenda knew from the age of five she wanted to be a doctor, declaring it to anyone who would listen. At Girls Grammar she found inspirational teachers who nurtured that ambition. And in 1961 she became one of only six women in a class of more than 56 to graduate from the University of Queensland with an MBBS (Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery).
From here, she was posted to the PA as a Resident Medical Officer (RMO) and hit a major hurdle. As part of her training roster, Glenda was assigned to Pathology, where she was required to conduct regular postmortems. It was a task she found so overwhelming, it left her unable to eat.
The Director of Pathology became so concerned he contacted the Hospital Superintendent and said: `If you don’t take that girl out of Pathology she’s going to be the next one on the slab—she’s lost a stone in weight’, Glenda remembers.
A hasty transfer was arranged to the only available opening—Geriatrics. In the early 1960s, it was a relatively unknown field and, despite her misgivings, Glenda found herself captivated by both the medicine and the grateful and agreeable patients.
What other doctors found frustrating—managing multiple complex conditions—she found compelling, challenging and hugely rewarding.
`I loved it. In medicine we were taught to get all the facts and make one diagnosis. But in geriatric medicine they’ve got masses of pathology—they’ve got chronic respiratory disease; they’ve got cardiac failure; they’ve got all sorts of things. And I thought, there’s a lot of very good medicine here.’
It was the perfect environment for a doctor with deep wells of both empathy and curiosity. `In geriatric medicine we can’t cure, but we can care,’ she says emphatically. Glenda saw the huge gains specialist geriatric care could deliver to patients previously considered `too old’ for some treatments.
`You can’t say there’s nothing to be done. Never take away hope.'
Before long, she decided she wanted to specialise in geriatrics but, with no training programs in Australia, she had to travel to Scotland to gain her qualifications. In 1969 she returned to Queensland as only the third geriatrician in the state and the first female practitioner.
Her first role was to establish Southside Community Home Care Service, leading an `exceptional’ team of nurses, social workers and therapists to deliver health services to seniors both at home and in care facilities.
It was a lowkey start. `Our office was above a fish and chip shop opposite the Mater Children’s Hospital,’ Glenda remembers. In the early days it was hard work convincing GPs they weren’t trying to poach patients. But the referrals began to flow when they saw the benefits of specialist assessment and care.
One of those early referrals stopped Glenda in her tracks when she arrived at an aged care home and realised the patient was one of her former BGGS teachers Miss Marion McLean. When Miss McLean complained how stultifying she found life within the confines of the home, Glenda hatched a plan. `I said to her, ``Well Miss McLean I often do home visits down to the bayside suburbs. You might like to come with me for a drive one day.’' '
Quick as a flash, Miss McLean added that former Principal Kathleen Lilley was also in a nursing home and would probably enjoy coming along too. Before she knew it, Glenda was driving down to Wynnum with two Girls Grammar stalwarts issuing instructions from the backseat like they were back in office. `It was like junior mistress and senior mistress again,’ she laughed.
Glenda packed morning tea for her ride-alongs and set the duo up in a park while she visited patients, returning them home that evening.
`Miss Lilley wrote me the most beautiful letter—I still have it—thanking me for my kindness.’
Once a headmistress always a headmistress ... Kathleen Lilley
Glenda at BGGS where her medical ambitions were encouraged
To Glenda, the excursion was merely repaying the kindness Girls Grammar had extended her, nurturing and encouraging her ambitions. In particular, she remembers her beloved Chemistry teacher Mrs Ryland, sister of famed communist barrister Max Julius, who urged her to `just go for it’ when she shared her medical ambitions.
`Nobody here (at BGGS) ever doubted that I would do medicine and nobody ever tried to change my mind,’ she says.
Miss Lilley did, however, draw the line at letting Glenda drop History. `She was adamant that you had to have a rounded education. She said, `I’d rather they were fine women than bad doctors’.’ Over the course of a distinguished career Glenda has played a major role in building geriatric services at Greenslopes Repatriation Hospital, Ipswich Hospital and the PA, changing the way many in the medical and broader community view ageing. Instead of seeing disease and disability as inevitable, it is now accepted these conditions can be effectively treated and managed in old age, just as they are at other stages.
`There is no disease due to age alone, there's always pathology,’ she explains. `The older you are, you're more likely to get it. But it's not because of that.’
Accompanying this change in attitude have been huge medical advances. Stroke care used to dominate geriatrics at the start of Glenda’s career, but treatment is so effective it has significantly diminished that load. She hopes the same will soon be true for today’s most common and devastating disease: dementia.
Encouraging top students to consider pathways in scientific research, she said: `The Queensland Brain Institute (at the University of Queensland) is going to blow us all away one day.’
Along with pioneering change in healthcare delivery, Glenda has also championed change within the health establishment, becoming the first female president of the Australian Association of Gerontology (AAG) in 1980 and paving the way not only for other women to hold the post, but those from other disciplines. Her successor at the AAG was the first nurse to lead the association.
Giving back has always been key to Glenda, who maintains an ongoing connection to her Girls Grammar friends.
`We’ve had some very interesting reunions—which mostly I’ve organised!’ she laughs.
Glenda Powell (Machin, 1955) with her BGGS classmates, from left, Ruth Thomson (Smith, 1955), Thea Booth (Wilson, 1955) and Lexie Smiles (Kunze, 1955)