The Dash Between: Elyria’s Dr. D.C. Patel traveled the world
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As he traveled the world, Dr. D.C. Patel often sported clothing featuring his hometown and the seat of his loyalties.
From the logos of Cleveland’s professional sports teams on his T-shirts, knowledgeable onlookers could have figured that the Elyria physician lived in Ohio.
“He loved to play golf and he liked to go to sporting events – Cavaliers, Browns and Indians,” his friend Bill Tattersall said. “I went to University of Michigan. From time to time, he would go to Ann Arbor with me” to attend a game.
D.C., who was devoted to his wife, Minal, and daughters, Rachna and Rakhee, also wore shirts and ball caps touting the field hockey teams on which his daughters played at Lake Ridge Academy and Wellesley College.
| The Dash Between: About this feature |
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 Alana Baranick The Dash Between is an obituary feature written by Alana Baranick about regular folks from Lorain County and adjacent areas. Baranick wrote her first obit in 1985 when she was a reporter for The Chronicle. She wrote obituaries for Cleveland’s Plain Dealer from 1992 through 2008.  "Life on the Death Beat" She is the chief author of “Life on the Death Beat: A Handbook for Obituary Writers” and director of the Society of Professional Obituary Writers. She won the 2005 American Society of Newspaper Editors Distinguished Writing Award in the Obituary category. Today, Alana Baranick examines The Dash Between May 1, 1946, when D.C. Patel was born in Wobulenzi, Uganda, and May 18, 2010, when the Elyria physician died of complications from prostate cancer at age 64. The Dash Between is scheduled to appear in The Chronicle every other Sunday. To suggest a story or make a comment, contact Baranick at abaranick@chroniclet.com. Read more:
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His clothing may not have showed his loyalty to the organizations to which he belonged, to his friends, to his Indian heritage or to his patients, but his words and actions did.
For example, he helped make fried ice cream at the Elyria Rotary Club booth at the annual Apple Festival. He volunteered at the salad station of the Rotary’s steak fries.
And he knew his vegetables, as he grew a combination of the common and the exotic, including bitter melon, in his home garden.
“He was always eager to share his crops and deliver them in person to all his friends,” his wife said.
He also golfed with friends at Oberlin Golf Club as often as he could.
“His most exciting moment as a member was probably when he got a hole-in-one,” his wife said.
D.C. also went on golf outings far from home with a group of physicians from Lorain and Cuyahoga counties, and he traveled with his family to countries including New Zealand, China and Egypt. He also went to such American tourist attractions as Ruby Falls in Chattanooga, Tenn., and Disney World in Orlando, Fla.
And he made many trips to visit family in India.
“He was very proud of coming from India,” Tattersall said. “He loved to talk about the history of India – political, social history. Going to football games (in Michigan), he liked to expound on that for a couple of hours there and back, and how he appreciated opportunities in the United States.”
Before his birth, his parents left their native India to find economic opportunities in Uganda, where D.C. was born Dinubhai C. Patel, on May 1, 1946. There, his father owned a general store, and his mother, a homemaker, raised D.C. and his two younger siblings.
Because his family lived in a small village with limited educational opportunities, D.C. spent his middle-school years at a boarding school in Kampala, Uganda, before completing high school in Gujarat, India, and graduating from the Faculty of Medicine of Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, India, in 1972.
The following year, D.C. joined Catholic Medical Center of New York in Manhattan for his medical residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in gastroenterology.
In 1979, his cousin Dr. Paresh Patel, an Elyria surgeon, told him there was an opportunity for a gastroenterologist in Lorain County.
“Since I also got a residency in Cleveland, and Ohio seemed like a nice place to raise kids, we decided to move,” said his wife, who also is a doctor.
Their parents introduced them to one another in January 1969 and arranged their marriage. D.C. returned to the U.S. after their wedding and honeymoon, while Minal stayed in India to complete medical school. She joined him in America in 1976.
D.C. treated patients at Elyria Memorial Hospital, now EMH Regional Medical Center, from 1979 until November 2003. He was known for making patients and strangers feel comfortable.
Outside of work, D.C. talked golf and college basketball with Lee Cannaday, a patient who became a friend.
“He would lift you up in the conversations,” Cannaday said. “He had his own way of expressing himself. He was like one of a kind.”
Cannaday credits D.C. with saving his life in 1983 after a colon cancer diagnosis. The physician arranged for Cannaday to have surgery immediately to remove the diseased tissue to stop the cancer from spreading.
“He was old-school,” Cannaday said. “He did it all. Now, I see an internist, then (get) a colonoscopy and then (see) a gastroenterologist. After he retired, I had to go to three different doctors to get the same thing.”
D.C., who died May 18, 2010, at age 64, became familiar with the mission and procedures of the medical profession as a child when he suffered from malaria and tetanus.
And in his second year of medical school, he suffered from a pleural effusion, commonly known as water on the lungs.
“All of these things were life-threatening conditions, but he survived them,” his wife said. “I think he gained a lot of strength, perspective and compassion from these experiences that translated into his medical practice, his family life and ultimately, his battle with prostate cancer.”
His friend Tattersall said D.C.’s devotion extended to all areas of his life.
“He did not hesitate to spend as much time with you as you wanted to spend with him,” Tattersall said. “He was thoughtful. He was dignified. He was loyal to his friends.”
Contact Alana Baranick at (216) 862-2617 or abaranick@chroniclet.com.
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