What is that old adage? An apple a day keeps the doctor away? Well, after taking your children to Edgewood Paediatrics you may forbid them from ever touching the fruit again.

On July 1, American doctor Olutoyin O. Fayemi joined the medical team at the Paget practice. Tall, dark, handsome, and armed with a personality that every parent and child will love, Dr. Fayemi was born in Ibadan, Nigeria but was raised in White Plains, New York. His parents left their native country when the future doctor was just a few months old. Dr. Fayemi says he has visited the African country several times since his family's departure, the last time for his sister's wedding.

Dr. Fayemi, 33, has been married to his wife Annemarie for seven years and they have a three-year-old son, Cole. They are expecting their second child, a daughter, in October.

An avid artist, Dr. Fayemi took a non-traditional route on his way to earning his medical degree.

"I hold a Bachelor's degree in architecture. One of the things that I've always loved to do is draw. I enjoy graphic design and website design, superheroes and that type of thing. I thought that architecture would be a good balance of science because I had such a strong science background, science and art together," he says. "Then I decided in my sophomore year that I didn't like it as much as thought I would, and my second choice was medicine so I decided to go Pre-Med."

His decision to pursue medicine brought his parents, both of who are physicians, a great deal of joy. When asked if there was any pressure for him to become a doctor, he answers with a laugh: "Of course. When I told them that I was going Pre-Med, they let out a sigh of relief. My brother was a stock market analyst making more than both of my parents and they still thought he should have been a doctor. They were saying, 'Oh no, you should still go back to med school and become a doctor'.

"They were definitely pressuring him. My sister is also a doctor. She's a paediatric radiologist."

His brother is now retired.

After earning his medical training and degree from the prestigious Harvard Medical School, Dr. Fayemi trained at the Boston's Children's Hospital and remained there as a staff physician in the Emergency Department. For the last two years, he has worked in a large private practice in Boston before coming to Bermuda. Dr. Fayemi recalls how visits to the Island led to his desire to work here.

"My wife frequently visited the Island and has a number of friends here," he said.

"I would visit once in a while. We loved it here and decided that we would want to live in Bermuda so my wife did some research online for practices here. We heard that Dr. Perinchief was a Bermudian and was American-trained, which was what I was, so we thought he'd be the better person to contact first," he says.

And the rest is history. Dr. Fayemi says he enjoys getting to know his patients and their parents, an opportunity that was not always afforded while he was practising in the US.

"It's been wonderful so far and a different experience than in the States where I did less with the patients. Here I weigh them, measure them so I have more time to talk to them, compared to the States where it was more like a factory where someone would weigh, someone would measure, someone would ask them to tell them what's wrong and then I would put it all together. Then someone would come in and give them the shots.

"Sometimes I had five rooms going at the same time, so here it's much more personable."

The young doctor feels that, not only are his Bermudian patients nicer, their parents are nicer too and, he adds, more respectful.

"In the US, I came across children who grew up in white neighbourhoods, so when they saw I was a black doctor they were a little taken aback. I found that interesting. I find that it takes less to make a child smile at you here."

He says it is still too early in his tenure to ascertain which ailments seem prevalent among Bermuda's youth. He points out that he has seen four or five cases of chicken pox since his arrival ? more than half the number he treated throughout his entire medical training. He cites the population size combined with the shortage of chicken pox vaccine on the Island as possible key factors.

A Diplomate of the American Board of Pediatrics and a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Dr. Fayemi plans on making significant contributions to Edgewood Pediatrics while he is here, both medically and technologically.

"I am very into computers, so I would like to upgrade the whole system and do some computer charting. The good thing about computer charting is that there are a lot fewer errors ? things are a lot more efficient and it is much easier for us to read each other's notes. Medication dosing is all there so everything is just in one place and much easier to access so the care that patients receive is top notch.

"They've done tons of studies and in the US they are enforcing that everyone go to computer systems within the next five years. That's one of the things that I would like to do while I am here."

Socially, Dr. Fayemi hopes to be able to reach out to the youth in our community.

"I think the issues are the same but expressed differently outside of the US," he says. "One of the things that I really like doing is reaching out to the adolescent boys, especially African American boys. We have a shortage of them in the medical community. Being young, I hope I can understand where they are coming from. If I can make a difference in one person's life, that's tremendous to me and hopefully I can bring that here."

Along with spending time with his family, which he describes as his favourite pastime, Dr. Fayemi also enjoys swimming and all sorts of drawing, particularly website design. An acapella singer in college, he also hopes to get involved with a choir here. Armed with a newly minted drivers license, Dr. Fayemi says he believes he has adapted quite nicely to "driving on the other side of the road", although he laughs as he admits that he sometimes gets confused at unfamiliar intersections and roundabouts.

When asked what impact he would like to leave on the Island when his tenure is complete, Dr. Fayemi pauses before he answers.

"Medically, I would like to make an impact on the management of asthma on the Island. It's one of those diseases where if properly cared for, one who has it can enjoy a high quality of life.

"Socially, I would like to think that there would be people who would say that I touched their life. I'm not here to change Bermuda or change medicine here, but I believe that helping to change one person at a time is where you have to start.

He adds: "If there's an opportunity for me to do something that will allow me to have an impact on some people, then I'm open to that. You just have to start small and see where it goes."