Hugh Lovell-Smith was born 24 July 1921. He was the youngest of six children and was called Bill by his immediate family, to distinguish him from his father Hugh, who was a professional photographer.

He was attending primary school in Hastings when the Napier earthquake struck the district in 1932, and clearly remembered the pupils evacuating the classroom and being ordered to sit on the grass. Anyone slow to obey was swiftly thrown to the ground by the force of the quake.

After attending Hastings High School, he graduated with a BA degree from Victoria University College, and proceeded from there to teaching college in 1940. While still a student he joined the Army Medical Corps as a private.

He began teaching in 1941 but this was interrupted by Army mobilisation. Then followed approximately three years in military service including six months in the Pacific as a medical orderly in the Air Force. On discharge from the services he decided to study medicine, and he graduated from Otago Medical School in 1951.

Arriving in Dunedin in 1947, he found himself boarding with a fellow medical student, Frank Davie. It was only natural that he should meet Frank’s sister, Anne, who was in Dunedin doing a postgraduate nursing course. Anne and Hugh were married during Hugh’s final year.

The young couple moved to Napier, where Hugh was first a house surgeon, then registrar at Napier Hospital.

Having decided on a career in general practice, Hugh moved to Rangiora, where he joined Dr Laurie King in a country practice. When Dr King retired some years later, Hugh was able to invite his old school friend Dr Bill Young to join him. Four years later Bill Young moved on, and Dr Hartley Ferrar came to replace him. These were busy years, which included house calls to outlying areas, and maternity services at the local Rangiora Hospital.

When Hugh suffered a heart arrhythmia in 1972, he looked round for lighter work. He joined his brother-in-law, Frank Davie, to share a practice in Hoon Hay Road in Christchurch. With the introduction of the practice nurse scheme some years later, it became clear that the existing consulting space was too small, and in 1977 Frank moved to the new Hoon Hay Medical Centre with Keith Gibb and Richard Edmond. Hugh was invited to join them, but felt reluctant to take on a large financial commitment so late in his career. He remained working at the Hoon Hay Road surgery, and was joined some years later by his son David. Hugh then accepted part-time work as a medical officer at the nearby Sunnyside Psychiatric Hospital, and this became a full-time position in the final years of his medical career.

Together with his wife Anne, and his son David, Hugh became very involved in the teaching and practice of transcendental meditation, and he gave much of his spare time and energy to promoting this teaching. After moving from Rangiora to Christchurch, he bought a ten-acre property on the Cashmere hills, and this allowed him ample scope to devote to his great love of gardening.

Anne’s death from breast cancer in 1992 was a deeply felt loss for Hugh, and his final years were marred by slowly increasing dementia, which eventually required full-time nursing care until his death on 4 July 2003.

Hugh was a quiet, gentle, caring person, who devoted himself fully to his patients and his family. Time and money always seemed to be of little concern to him in his work.

Hugh is survived by two sons and two daughters.