Physician Profile: Joseph A. Hooper, M.D.
of CPC-Central
Joe Hooper didn’t take what
you would call the most direct route to his career in medicine, but his time
was well spent nonetheless. The unexpected curves and detours along the way
not only fueled Joe’s resolve but also offered life lessons that have shaped
his character and philosophies and nurtured his gift for finding humor in
just about anything.
For much of his childhood, Joe lived with his parents, James and Billie, and
his siblings, Jim, Max and Beth, in rural Kentucky, where the children
relished horseback riding through the spacious countryside and playing a
more realistic version of cowboys and Indians than most children enjoy.
After that, his upbringing reads like a U.S. geography lesson, thanks to his
father, an engineer whose job was to oversee the startup of new Southwire
Corporation plants around the country.
At age 10, Joe and his family left Kentucky for Roseville, California, near
Sacramento, where they lived for 2 years, followed by Florence in northwest
Alabama, where Joe spent his little league years, and then on to Decatur,
Georgia, where he attended high school from tenth grade until graduation.
At that point, he came face-to face with a “what next?” crisis, which
immobilized him for about a year while he pondered what to do with the rest
of his life The Air Force seemed a good place to start, so in 1987, he
enlisted for 4 years, during which he worked as a security policeman at
Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany.
One of the important lessons he took from his Air Force experience was the
value of standard procedures and teamwork. “We had to do things a certain
way every time, even when it seemed unnecessary,” Joe recalls. The rationale
for this practice eluded him until an emergency called for quick action.
Those seemingly unimportant procedures enabled an automatic and appropriate
response to the crisis, avoiding the potential danger of delayed reactions
and snap decisions “If you do things the same way all the time, then when it
really counts, you react quickly and do it the right way,” he says. “That
lesson applies not only to the military but to everything in life.”
By his third year of service, Joe had learned enough German to carry on a
conversation and enjoy a social life. Ultimately, albeit not directly,
that’s how he came to know his future wife, Liane. Their meeting was
orchestrated by a friend of Joe’s who spoke only English and a friend of
Liane’s who spoke only German. “Our friends wanted to date so Liane and I
agreed to tag along as chaperones and translators,” he recalls. In the
course of their friends’ courtship, Joe and Liane’s interest in each other
blossomed, and they continued to date even after their friends parted ways.
In 1990, Joe and Liane married in a 400-year-old church in the village of
Molschbach.
Following his service in the Air Force, Joe and Liane settled in a north
Georgia community, where Joe began looking for a job, despite being eligible
to receive unemployment benefits.
“I
live on the principle that if you are physically able to work, you should
work,” he said. True to his creed, he took a job at a chicken plant in
Baldwin, which ironically paid $80 per week less than he would have received
on unemployment. He left that job after two weeks and applied for a position
better suited to his experience. Being hired as a security guard presented
yet another opportunity to appreciate the incongruities of everyday life.
“My new job paid $1 less per hour than my previous job and it was at the
same poultry plant,” he says. “I thought I was in the Twilight Zone.”
With higher education now having much greater appeal to Joe than on the
heels of high school, he enrolled at North Georgia College in Dahlonega as a
23-yearold freshman with the unspoken goal of pursuing a medical career. “I
had always thought about becoming a doctor but it wasn’t until that point
that I was sure that’s what I wanted to do,” he recalls. Even so, he didn’t
declare his intentions when he entered college because he figured no one
would take him seriously.
With ample motivation and a well honed work ethic, Joe managed the demands
of his classes along with that of a 30-hour-a-week job. “College for me was
just school and work,” he said. “Not your typical experience.” Liane
supplemented the couple’s income working in a German bakery in Helen.
After receiving a degree in biology from NGC, Joe entered the Medical
College of Georgia, where his interest in family medicine as a specialty
continued to grow. “Family medicine offers more variety and an opportunity
to develop a relationship with the patient,” Dr. Hooper says. “Being a
doctor is about more than being a good technician, and family medicine is a
good place to bring all that together.” Dr. Hooper completed his internship
and residency at Rapid City Regional Hospital in South Dakota, where he and
Liane enjoyed living because it was so different in culture, climate, and
scenery from their previous experience. With their hearts still in Augusta,
though, they stayed with their plan to return and settle there.
Their first opportunity to get back to Georgia was an offer from a busy
medical group in Elberton, where Dr. Hooper subsequently practiced for two
years. “It was a good job and it took a good opportunity to get me to
leave,” he says. That opportunity came in the form of an opening at the
Center for Primary Care in Augusta. In addition to the couple’s wish to
return to Augusta, “CPC was appealing because of the quality of the doctors,
its good reputation, and the fact that it is growing,” Dr. Hooper says. He
also considers CPC’s diversity a strength.
The Hoopers have purchased a home in the Historic Hill section of Augusta,
which they love for its character and rich history. Once settled, they will
spend their leisure time with their sons, Jet, age 5, and Leo, age 3, and
frequently hosting friends and family visiting the area. Dr. Hooper began
working at CPC in December of last year and is anticipating a long
professional relationship with its physicians. “I am looking forward to the
support of this strong team of physicians and to the mentorship of those
more experienced to help me become a better doctor,” he explains. “In
return, I hope to someday do the same for others.”
Dr. Hooper can be reached by email at
jhooper@cpcfp.com.
