After a career spanning nearly seventy years, Kingston’s oldest practicing doctor is starting a new chapter. It’s called retirement. Dr.Edgar Barnett, a hypnotherapist, is retiring just a few months shy of his 90th birthday.
"It's been my life, oh yes," Dr. Barnett sitting behind his desk in his Kingston office.
The building that has housed Dr. Barnett’s office for all these decades is being torn down, giving him little choice but to stop practicing at 89-year-old.
“I said when I can't get up the stairs, I'll retire,” he said. “I learned they're going to pull the building down, so I thought I'd better get out before there are no stairs to come up, so that's really when I decided.”
Barnett has been practicing medicine since 1948, when he officially became a trained doctor in England. He was born there, and worked in the United Kingdom until moving to Canada in 1966.
He then set up shop in Kingston, where he has been working for nearly 50 years. Around 1975, he shifted from family medicine to mostly hypnotherapy, his true passion.
“It's something that's a part of all of us,” Dr. Barnett said sitting in his Kingston office. “We all have a subconscious mind. All we hypnotherapists do is access that.”
Dr. Barnett has seen thousands of patients over the decades, helping them with everything from overcoming fears, to quitting smoking.
His 90th birthday is in June, and he hopes to spend more time reading and playing the piano in his retirement. He also plans on travelling, starting with a trip down south next month.
Dr. Barnett says it has been rewarding to help so many people over his career, doing what he loves. It’s what’s kept him coming in to work for 67 years, and what he will remember as he begins his next chapter, away from the doctor’s office.
Dr. Barnett's last day seeing patients at his Princess St. office in downtown Kingston will be on March 26.
