Doctor Rohe honored during reception
CARIBOU — Physician colleagues, hospital administration, and many staff members at Cary Medical Center recently paid tribute to Ronald Rohe, M.D., oncologist/hematologist, who has served patients at the hospital for more than 36 years.
Contributed photo
After providing cancer care services in Cary Medical Center’s Specialty Clinic for more than 36 years, Dr. Ronald Rohe, oncologist/hematologist, was recently honored at a farewell retirement reception attended by physician colleagues, hospital administration and many Cary staff members. Dr. Rohe and his wife, Toni, were presented with several gifts from the hospital. With Dr. Rohe, far right, are, from left, Kris Doody, RN, Cary CEO; Toni Rohe and Allan Espinosa, MD, one of Cary’s full-time oncologist/hematologists working to build the hospital’s new Jefferson Cary Oncology Center.
Rohe, who has completed his work at the hospital and is nearing retirement, has provided care to patients in the Oncology and Specialty Services Clinic at the hospital. While he has done this on a part-time basis over the years, Cary CEO, Kris Doody, RN, MSB, FACHE, said that if it were not for his work, the hospital would not have had a cancer service.
“Dr. Rohe has provided a wonderful service for our cancer patients and their families over these many years,” said Doody, who praised the physician for the care he provided to her late father. “Not only has he been an outstanding physician but he always gave patients the options and they were at the center of his work with them. He is highly regarded by his colleagues throughout the state of Maine and at the specialty cancer centers in Boston like Dana Farber. We were privileged to have him with us all these years and he will truly be missed.”
Rohe is leaving his work at Cary as the hospital is building its full-time oncology/hematology practice with the new Jefferson Cary Oncology Center. Allan Espinosa, M.D. oncologist/hematologist at Cary praised Dr. Rohe as a great mentor and very conscientious physician.
“We have very much appreciated the way he has welcomed myself and my colleague, Dr. Nadia Rajack,” said Espinosa, who came to Cary more than a year ago from Vanderbilt University to establish the full-time practice at the hospital. “I can tell you he was practicing at the very top of his field and reviewing his charts as patients are transitioning I was very impressed. He is a great role model for us and we hope to benefit from his experience.”
The hospital presented Rohe with a limited framed print collage of the hospital done by artist John Hafford and a mantle clock. A number of his colleagues commented on his dedication to his work and his patient care. Dr. Rodolphe Camy of the VA Community Based Outpatient Clinic on the Cary campus said that Dr. Rohe had great respect among the veterans community.
“Our veterans really appreciated Dr. Rohe, and he was always there when we would call him on an urgent issue,” said Camy, who is one of two physicians working at the VA Clinic.
Donna Small, RN, retired, volunteers at the Cary oncology clinic and was one of the original nurses to work in the clinic when Dr. Rohe began his time at Cary in 1978. She spoke of the personal impact Dr. Rohe had on her as she lost two sisters and a husband to cancer.
“Our clinic began because Dr. Rohe was willing to come to Cary for the benefit of our patients back in 1978,” said Small, whose late husband Ogden was a well know optometrist in Caribou. “It was difficult working in the clinic and having my two sisters being treated at the same time. Dr. Rohe was there for me, as he was when I lost my husband to a rare form of cancer — as he has been for hundreds if not thousands of patients over his career.”
Small also positively described Dr. Rohe’s work ethic.
“On the day he would come to Cary to do his clinic he would get up at 4:30 a.m. to do a consult for a patient in the hospital in Presque Isle, then he would come to Cary and see patients all day. He rarely stopped for lunch and he wouldn’t leave the clinic until all the patients had been seen — and this might go well into the early evening. He did the same at clinics in Fort Kent and Madawaska,” she said.
Dr. Rohe, who worked a full-time practice in Presque Isle and continues to work at The Aroostook Medical Center, served the hospitals in Caribou and Fort Kent. Later, for the convenience of patients in Madawaska, he opened a clinic there. He worked all the clinics for many years traveling through all four season.
Several of those attending the farewell reception in the Chan Center spoke of family members who’d seen Dr. Rohe and traveled to Boston for a second opinion (which the doctor always included in the options he gave to his patients) noted how specialists at the cancer centers in Boston respected Dr. Rohe and agreed with his findings.
Dr. Rohe expressed his gratitude for the gifts and kind words and said that he had enjoyed his time at Cary Medical Center. Attending the reception with his wife Toni, he recounted the history of the clinic and the good people he had worked with. Both Dr. Rohe and his wife said they were looking forward to spending more time with their two sons and their grandchildren in New Hampshire.
