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 Half a century ago, stamps cost 4 cents; television – for those lucky enough to have one – was black and white; air conditioning was unheard of; and schools, water fountains and waiting rooms were segregated by race. Polio was epidemic ... doctors made house calls ... and sometimes patients paid for medical care with fresh peas and homemade pies.
That was the world that fresh young physicians Charles Hollis and Thomas Johnson found when they hung out their shingle in Albany in 1954, establishing what today is Albany Internal Medicine. Six years later, they were joined by Dr. Dempsey Guillebeau. The practice weathered lean years, upheavals in society and transitions in medical knowledge and technology to make a lasting contribution to the health and well-being of southwest Georgia.
Over the years, the physicians say, they had lots of help, from the lab technicians who were the practice’s first employees to the nurses and office staff who provided invaluable support. “We also had the confidence of the doctors who were already in town,” Dr. Hollis recalled. “Also those who lived out of town, who called on us for consultations. We were out of town a lot, seeing patients in Bainbridge, Camilla, Tifton, Cordele.”
When AIM began, 40 doctors comprised Albany’s medical community, Dr. Hollis said. “Now there are over 200 in Albany,” he said.
Further, Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital, which was the only Albany hospital, had a ward devoted to polio patients, but no intensive care unit. Penicillin was new, people weren’tconcerned about cholesterol and treatment for high blood pressure was “drastic and not very effective,” Dr. Johnson said. “Bills were modest, compared to nowadays.”
But few patients had insurance, he said. While patients couldn’t always pay, at least paperwork didn’t clog the medical system the way it does 50 years later, he added.
AIM’s physicians were the first to specialize in cardiology here. “We wanted to come to a town that needed specialists,” explained Dr. Hollis. Drs. Hollis and Johnson befriended each other as freshmen at Emory University in 1942, went to medical school together and interned at Grady Hospital in Atlanta. After being shipped to Germany to treat injured U.S. soldiers during World War II, they returned to Emory Hospital and received fellowships in cardiology.
They were encouraged to set up their practice here by two Albanians, insurance broker W.W. Pace and dentist Dr. Russell Grace, who had both been treated for heart problems at Emory.
“We liked the looks of the town,” Dr. Hollis’ wife, Carolyn, said. “We lived in Dolly Madison apartments.” The first year, though busy, was not profitable.
Even though office visits tended to be $3 to $6, at the end of the first six months, the practice hadn’t collected a penny, the physicians recalled. House calls were routine.
From the first, AIM was known for innovations and outstanding service. “We had as good a laboratory as the hospital, and excellent, nationally-certified technicians,” Johnson said.
The doctors were instrumental in persuading Phoebe to open an intensive care unit. They helped run the Georgia Heart Clinic and were trail-blazers in the use of echocardiology in the community. AIM was the first practice to employ physician’s assistants, who are now an integral part of most practices.
In addition, Albany Internal Medicine was the first to do away with segregated waiting rooms. “I took down the sign,” Dr. Johnson recalled. When patients continued to sit in separate rooms anyway, the practice closed down one waiting room and channeled all patients into the one remaining waiting room.
Further, when the physicians determined that an African-American colleague, Dr. J.L. Shirley, didn’t have hospital privileges, they brought his name before the credentials panel, Dr. Johnson said. “Some frowned, but they passed him,” he said, and Dr. Shirley became the first black physician to practice at Phoebe.
In the late 60s and 70s, the practice was involved in an accredited teaching program that brought interns to Albany as part of their surgery rotation, Dr. Guillebeau noted.
Meanwhile, Dr. Hollis was tapped to serve as president of the Medical Association of Georgia. As the head of MAG, he became acquainted with Dr. Tommy Frisk, a Tennessee physician who established Hospital Corporation of America. Through that relationship, Palmyra Park Hospital was established here in the 1970s. Hollis also founded MAG Mutual, an Atlanta-based malpractice insurance company.
Throughout the years, said the physicians, they established lasting relationships with patients. “We saw younger patients when we began our practice,” Dr. Hollis said. “We followed them through their life cycle.”
Drs. Hollis and Johnson retired together, just as they had started together, in 1995. Dr. Guillebeau followed suit four years later.
Today, AIM is made up of 12 physicians and a staff of 55. It continues to serve as the premier internal medicine practice in Southwest Georgia. Most importantly, it maintains its tradition of personal as well as professional trust with its patients.
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