Doctor gifted us 35 years
Dr Amana Thornley, centre, thanked for long service by City Mission community mental health nurse Julie Brine, left, and City Missioner Corinne Haines.
“Life's not worth living if you don't consider people who are less fortunate than you are. If you can't give somebody a leg up, or if you can't share what you can spare, then you are not a part of the community you are living in.” This is the heartwarming explanation Dr Amama Thornley gives when asked why she has given her time over an incredible 35 years to look after homeless people at the City Mission.
She retired from our voluntary doctor roster in September and we will miss her calm, caring and compassionate service.
“Life’s not worth living if you don’t consider people who are less fortunate than you are.”
In 1988 a group of doctors set up a once-a-week roster to volunteer and come in and look after our homeless clients in the shelters. Amama was part of the group and she has continued her visits right through building a career as a GP and raising a family and we are grateful for what she has given over those decades.
The volunteer doctors work closely alongside our Community Mental Health Nurse to check on the health of our shelter residents and take action when it is needed. Amama says that can include providing medical certificates, prescriptions, treatment for colds, fungal infections, skin infections, bronchitis, urinary tract infections – problems which homeless people are particularly vulnerable to, plus giving referrals for other health services.
She was awarded a New Zealand Order of Merit in this year’s New Year’s Honours for services to health and is highly regarded in many areas including sexual abuse care, but it’s how she has cared for our whanau that will be our lasting memory. Amama says many Mission clients have been badly affected by the trauma of a horrendous childhood and she “always tried to talk to them as if they were my family, and I think they appreciated that”. “They don’t feel secure, they don’t have a home or a place they can call home, they don’t have parents or anyone they can trust, or turn to.”
She has just turned 80 and when she trained as a doctor very few women took that path. She remembers clearly that many people had the mindset that women students were taking a man’s place at university, and this was a waste because they would only get married, have children and give up medicine.
She worked hard for many decades to prove that wrong and our City Mission clients have benefitted from her sense of purpose.