At first Dr Danny Ryan didn't quite understand it when he was told he'd been named Nambucca Valley's Citizen of the Year.
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He was driving back from a treatment in Brisbane when he heard word.
"It came completely out of the blue and I asked them to put it in writing," he said.
When it sank in I felt very honoured and grateful - to be recognised by your community is a really, really nice thing.
"But I also felt a little embarrassed too. Being a doctor gives you a status and an opportunity to be seen. But there's a lot of people who do fantastic work in the community and don't get seen - I really admire those people.
"Plus I think maybe I got the sympathy vote," he says, self-deprecatingly, after having spent the greater part of last year repairing after a bone marrow transplant.
But it seems perfectly fitting that Dr Ryan be given council's highest honour for the year that saw the fruition of our brand new district hospital.
For nearly four years he was the public face of the fight for Macksville Hospital.
"It was a steep learning curve for me. In the past I wouldn't have been comfortable being the spokesperson for something like that," he said.
But he was a passionate advocate, with a strong and convincing message: without a new hospital, there would come a day when Macksville wouldn't have a hospital at all.
"The old hospital was built in the 1950s and it was pretty clear that it was no longer fit for purpose," he said.
"There'd been no major renovations done, and the emergency department was the last major add-on - in the late '80s.
"There was really very little maintenance done, and we used to joke that there was lead in the old paint peeling off the walls - whether that was true or not I don't know.
"The bathrooms were a long way from the patients' beds so nurses had to put them on a commode chair to transport them to the bathrooms.
"Infection control was virtually impossible.
"And it was difficult to attract young doctors, nurses and allied health professionals to a hospital that was clearly on its last legs.
I could see there would come a time when the decision would be made to shut it down, and then what were people going to do?
The rub came when it was revealed the Local Health District had no plans to fix the situation.
As a board member of NVC, Dr Ryan spoke with the other board members and the CEO to ask if they'd be prepared to get behind a campaign for a new hospital, to which they agreed.
He still remembers that very first public meeting.
"It was on May 25, 2014, and I remember because the opening of the hospital was almost six years to the day since the campaign launched," he said.
"360 people turned up to Macksville RSL on a Sunday morning, which goes to show how much interest and concern there was. Plus there'd been a lot of money donated by the community to the hospital over a long period of time.
"And that was really the start of it."
From there momentum built with every letter written by the community, every signature on the petition. A facebook page was even set up to keep the community informed.
"I think people could see there was a need, and I think they were shocked to find there was no plan to do anything about it," he said.
It really was a campaign that united the Nambucca Valley.
Dr Ryan affords some of the campaign's victory to its timing.
"Most other hospitals on the coast had recently had a reasonable sum spent on them. But there was never any mention of Macksville. That was something that riled me a little - that we seemed to be invisible," he said.
"But to their credit the State Government listened to us.
"After the sale of poles and wires there was a little bit of money to spend. They could see there was a need, and there was a definite feeling that it was our turn."
The LNP State Government made a pre-election promise to spend $50 million on a major upgrade of the Macksville Hospital if it were to hold onto power in the March 2015 election.
There was initial jubilation in the community after that win. But many soon became convinced that renovating the old hospital would be like putting lipstick on a pig.
The Nambucca Valley Council put pressure on the government by requesting a cost-benefit analysis on a redevelopment versus a 'greenfield' construct - a completely new hospital.
"Health Infrastructure put a business case forward that spending an extra $23 million to build new on a greenfield site would be money better spent," Dr Ryan said.
"It was found the old building couldn't be renovated - the plumbing and the electrics were in the cavities between the bricks, and there was asbestos throughout. It would have been a nightmare to renovate."
"So the only way they could do it was to build an entirely new building on site - but where would it go? In the carpark? Where would people park? And how would they build around a functioning hospital?
"Fortunately a greenfield site was available at the concrete batching plant because they'd just finished the highway upgrade."
After another year-long campaign the Nambucca Valley community had gotten their way, when a new $73 million hospital was proposed on the concrete batching site in North Macksville in December 2017.
"It took a little while for us to get our heads around the fact that we were going to get a brand new hospital - what was it going to look like? And what can you get for $73 million?," Dr Ryan said.
While others took the lead on those questions, Dr Ryan acted as liaison between the hospital staff and the planning group.
"I wasn't instrumental in the design process - I was there to facilitate communication," he said.
"I spent a lot of time with the nurses designing the in-patient units.
"And fortunately we got most of what we asked for."
Dr Ryan wasn't able to attend the new Macksville District Hospital on the day it opened - unfortunately, few were due to COVID.
But it was a proud day for him when he was able to take a tour.
The first thing you notice is that it's a beautiful building - that's one thing that's personally satisfying for me.
- Dr Danny Ryan
"The operating suite is beautiful too - and very functional. It's nice to be in an operating theatre with windows.
"And the emergency department is much bigger. The old ED, you always felt pressured to move people out of beds to make room to treat someone else - which isn't ideal.
Dr Ryan said the new hospital campaign had been taxing, in a way, but the results were well-worth the effort.
"I've been given so much by this community, I felt like I owed it to them to give back," he said.
"And I've always felt an obligation to make the world a better place - that's how I was brought up."
Congratulations Dr Danny Ryan, a most deserving Citizen of the Year.
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Mel Leigh Dee
Mel is a journalist at the Guardian News and is based in Macksville.
Mel is a journalist at the Guardian News and is based in Macksville.
