A FORMER GP who worked in East Oxford for nearly 40 years has died aged 86.

Mike Bull became a young doctor in Iffley Road after beginning his career at the Radcliffe Infirmary.

At the time he lived above the surgery and, before telephones were common patients, would come to the house at night to summon the doctor from his bed by using a speaking tube.

The 1960s were a time of huge innovation in general practice and in Oxford the East Oxford Health Centre was built and Dr Bull arranged for the partnership to move into the new premises.

Changes in the GP contract made it possible to employ receptionists while midwives, health visitors and district nurses started to work more closely with family doctors. A proper system of education for young GPs was being developed.

Dr Bull was enthusiastic about these changes and helped to train and mentor young GPs.

One great interest was in obstetrics and he attended more than 2,000 births in his career.

He led the GP Maternity Unit in Oxford for many years, providing hospital facilities with some of the informality of a home setting.

Dr Bull was also involved in the student health service at Oxford Brookes University and in Helen House hospice, East Oxford.

He became medical officer for St John’s Home when the weekly round of patients followed by a coffee with the Reverend Mother of the All Saints Sisters were a regular highlight of his week.

As the years passed East Oxford Health Centre became too small and the practice moved into newly built St Bartholomew’s Medical Centre in Manzil Way.

It was here that he worked for the last few years of his career until he retired in 1992.

Mr Bull was born on December 8, 1926, the son of a yeoman farmer from Waterstock.

He went to Lord Williams Grammar School in Thame and then St Edward’s School in Summertown before studying medicine at University College, Oxford.

In his teens he was interested in the mechanisation of farm machinery which was then mostly horse-drawn.

He designed and built a hydraulically-operated front loader for the farm tractor which was used for many years.

After qualifying as a doctor he worked at the Radcliffe Infirmary where he met his future wife, Ida Hansford, who was a nurse.

They married in 1952 in University College’s chapel and went on to have four children.

At the same time as East Oxford Health Centre opened, Dr Bull’s family moved to a newly-built house in Headington where he lived for the rest of his life.

His daughter Philippa, who suffered from breast cancer, died in 2007.

Dr Bull died on October 21 and his funeral took place in Waterstock on November 5. He is survived by his wife, three of his children, Felicity, Belinda and Charles, and nine grandchildren.