Wentworthville doctor Maurice Matta to retire after 50 years as GP in suburb

A well-loved GP and obstetrician who has served one community for more than 50 years was always destined to work in Sydney’s west. On the eve of his retirement, he explains why.

Dr Maurice Matta is about to call time on his rewarding 52-year career as a GP at Wentworthville.

When the soon-to-retire GP and obstetrician Maurice Matta migrated to Australia from London, he was presented with a long list of hospitals to work at but given his surname, the title of one particular facility made the choice simple.

“They gave me the name of some hospitals and one of them was Parramatta and my name is Matta,’’ he said.

“I had no idea where the hospitals were – but I found that one with ‘matta’ and I thought ‘that sounds OK, I’ll go there’.’’

The 81 year old with the effortless bedside manner will hang up the stethoscope in June, and vividly recalls it was at the hospital, (now Jeffrey House community health centre) where he met the late former Australian Medical Association NSW president Anthony Buhagiar.

He was the hospital’s visiting medical officer and had established a practice at nearby Pritchard St, Wentworthville. He was impressed with Dr Matta and invited him to join the clinic.

Dr Maurice Matta at the Lane Street Medical Centre in Wentworthville.

Dr Matta in 1972, the year he arrived in Australia.

“He met me and he said ‘you’re talented, you speak so many languages, people like you, I would like you to join my practice’ and that was it,’’ Dr Matta said.

“Thank God I didn’t pick Cabramatta, otherwise I wouldn’t be joining Buhagiar.’’

Dr Matta graduated with honours from Cairo University and worked in hospitals in the UK for more than two years before spotting a billboard that advertised a sun-drenched Australia at a tube station in overcast London.

“I come from Egypt – nice and sunny – and in London, you know how it is – very dark and gloomy – and I said ‘why not, I’ll go to Australia’,’’ he said.

He flew his young family to Sydney and split his time between Parramatta Hospital and the Wentworthville practice for 18 months from 1972 before making the latter his permanent workplace.

Along with doctors Buhagiar and Matta, the former Parramatta Eels team doctor Peter Manollaras and Dr Anton Petrik, and later Dr Philip Lee, the GPs became a community mainstay in the heart of Wentworthville.

They began working from an old house at 8 Pritchard St until the modern blonde brick practice opened a couple doors down in the mid-1980s.

The former doctors’ practice at Wentworthville.

Since 2017, Dr Matta has worked at the Lane Street Medical Centre in the same suburb.

He delivered hundreds – if not more than 1000 babies — between 1972 and 2000.

During the early years, fathers were rarely allowed in delivery suites but one constant Dr Matta always loved was watching a woman overcome the agony of labour to experience the elation after a baby was born.

“I’m very proud of the people who I delivered,’’ he said.

“I see people now, in the shopping centre, like in David Jones, and the guy is almost 40 years and he said ‘Dr Matta, you delivered me’.’’

Dr Maurice Matta in recent years when he became a life member of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners.

Born in Cairo with a mix of Italian, French and Egyptian heritage, Dr Matta can speak French, Arabic, Italian and Spanish, and soon picked up the Maltese lingo, which helped him communicate with patients who had migrated to western Sydney in the practice’s early days.

“When I told them I’m finishing, some of the Italian and Maltese people who I knew for almost 50 years, believe me, they cried’’ he said.

“They said ‘Where are we going to go now’?’’ I said it’s time to say goodbye because of my age and my health.

“I love people and maybe that’s why the Health Department is not very happy with me – because I seem to spend a lot of time with patients,’’ he laughed.

Dr Matta considered being a pilot but decided to follow his father’s footsteps and study medicine.

Now the seasoned traveller is anticipating more time for his passions of travel, music and landscape photography.

He will retire on June 6 and plans to travel to the US with his wife Elizabeth to attend his granddaughter’s graduation in California.

It’s not the first time he has contemplated retirement but would often think “what am I going to do with myself?”

“That’s the job I love, and I love to talk to people and people love to talk to me, so why not? “It’s good for both sides but this year, I’m getting more than 80, I think it’s time to call it a day.’’