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Promising Young Doctor Mourned

Excerpt taken from http://www.thewest.com.au/default.aspx?MenuID=146&ContentID=158395

Crash victim: Camille Michener was an up-and-coming young doctor.
The medical fraternity is mourning the loss of one its brightest up and coming stars who died in a car crash.

Camille Michener, 30, was killed instantly after her Hyundai station wagon left Albany Highway and hit a tree about 10km south of Kojonup on Friday night.

Family and friends described her as an intelligent, loving and beautiful person who put others first.

Australian Medical Association WA president Gary Geelhoed said Dr Michener’s loss would be felt throughout the fraternity.

He said Dr Michener, who in 2007 served as the WA chair of the AMA doctors in training committee, was a talented gynaecologist and obstetrician who had made her mark through heavy involvement in a national campaign against unsafe working hours for young doctors. “She was a particularly warm friendly person, a very good doctor and certainly someone who was seen as one of the bright young up and coming stars,” he said.

Dr Michener’s mother, Helen, said she was born and raised in country Victoria and arrived in WA in 2004 to take an internship at Fremantle Hospital. She made a home in Cottesloe, where she was returning to on Friday night after finishing a six-month rotation at Albany Hospital.

“She rang me to say, ‘I’m heading back to my beloved Cottesloe’. She was going home,” Mrs Michener said.

Dr Michener’s father, Norm, said his daughter, who was based at King Edward Memorial Hospital, knew at age six that she wanted to be a doctor.

Despite the pressures of work and study, she frequently took time out to do voluntary work.

She went to Indonesia in 2005 to help survivors of the Indian Ocean tsunami despite having approaching exams. Just weeks after her return, she sat for an exam for her diploma in obstetrics and got the highest mark for the oral component of the test in Australia, an achievement which earned her the prestigious Royal Australian New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists award.

Kojonup police said the cause of the crash was being investigated.

Mr and Mrs Michener said the 110kmh speed limit on sections of Albany Highway should be reviewed.

JOSEPH CATANZARO