Father-Son Continuity in the Doctor’s Office
After 41 Years, Dr. Hinson Stephens Has Retired as Medical Director--Succeeded by Dr. Mike Stephens!
> The calm and steady hand of a Dr. Stephens has served continually as Medical Director of Moosehaven for more than 41 years--and until last year, it was the same Dr. Stephens!
Hinson Stephens, MD, a family practitioner from Orange Park, FL, began serving as Moosehaven’s chief physician in 1964, when he was 33 and just four years out of the University of Miami Medical School.
Four decades later, deciding late last year to dial back his workload at age 73, Dr. Stephens stepped aside at Moosehaven--in favor of Mike Stephens, MD, the senior doctor’s son, who has served as his father’s professional colleague both at Moosehaven and in private practice since 1994.
The senior Stephens, whose first office was right across Park Avenue from Moosehaven’s front gate, was approached in ’64 by then-Superintendent Charles McCall, who was dealing with an elderly physician who “didn’t want to quit.” McCall asked Stephens to follow the elder man around with longtime chief nurse Dorothy Davis, “sort of make a second round to make sure he didn’t make any mistakes.” Dr. Stephens once formally installed as Medical Director (though “we never had a contract,” he added) was soon involved in consultation on plans for the “new” Paul P. Schmitz Health Center in 1966-67. More than 30 years and thousands of Moosehaven patients later, he was again consulted on plans for the sprawling LifeCare Center, completed in 2002. (In between, he signed more than 160 Moose members and earned the Pilgrim Degree of Merit in 1977.)
Dr. Mike Stephens, now 44, was just three when his dad began at Moosehaven. After growing up in Orange Park, he graduated from Florida State University and ultimately received his MD from the University of Miami in 1992. After serving a residency at St. Vincent’s Hospital in Jacksonville, he joined his father’s family practice in ’94.
The senior Dr. Stephens continues his practice in his Kingsley Avenue office, but it is Dr. Mike Stephens who now directs Moosehaven’s medical operation--conducting a three-day-a-week clinic and making rounds throughout the LifeCare complex.
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Please click on any photograph below to view a larger image.
Dr. Hinson Stephens
(right foreground), who became Moosehaven’s medical director in 1964, was succeeded in that post late last year by his son, Dr. Mike Stephens. The two are pictured in an exam room in Moosehaven’s LifeCare Center. |
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May/June/July 2005
