Dr Iverach was born in Temuka and educated at Temuka District High School. There he became a pupil teacher and graduated BA in English, Latin and mental and moral philosophy at Canterbury College and at Canterbury Teachers’ Training College. This early interest in the classics was to last to later in his life and he continued to regularly read Latin authors in the original.

In 1917, he enlisted in the Canterbury Infantry Regiment as a private. Subsequently, he served with the New Zealand Force in France, rose to the rank of lieutenant and was awarded the Military Cross for gallantry. On discharge from the Army in 1919 he began the medical course at the University of Otago. Among his contempories were EF D’Ath, DE Denny-Brown and AH McIndoe. He graduated in 1924 and was awarded the Marjorie McCallum Medal in medicine and the travelling scholarship. Working in Dunedin Hospital under Dr F Fitchett and Dr DW Carmalt Jones he began his lifelong interest in clinical medicine and later became AMO of the Hospital.

In 1925 he took up his scholarship and went to Edinburgh where he studied under Dr Murray Lyon. Edinburgh was a very strong influence on his life and he became a stalwart of its teaching methods in Dunedin. The MRCPE was obtained in 1926 and at the end of that year he came back to Dunedin to begin his practice as a consulting physician.

Dr Iverach was appointed honorary assistant physician to outpatients, Dunedin Hospital, and part-time lecturer in medicine at the medical school in 1927. Part of his teaching duties included prescribing and pharmacy and he edited an edition of the Dunedin Hospital Formulary. Then he established a commanding position as the outstanding clinician in the town who was to exercise a profound influence on many generations of medical students. He became FRCPE in 1934 and was a foundation Fellow of The Royal Australasian College of Physicians in 1938.

Upon Dr Fitchett’s retirement in 1939 he became senior lecturer in medicine and senior physician and also lecturer in pharmacology to the dental school. Throughout the Second World War he carried an immense load of teaching and consulting practice. In recognition of his services to the University he was made associate professor in clinical medicine in 1951. Retirement from the staff came in 1956 and he kept on his private practice for another two years.

Many offices came to him and in 1945-46 he was vice-president of The Royal Australasian College of Physicians for the Dominion of New Zealand. He also served the College as a member of the New Zealand committee and as a member of the board of censors for many years. For some years he had been a member of the Medical Council and was still a member at the time of his death. At one time he was a member of the New Zealand Medical Advisory Council.

Dr Iverach was associated with the Otago University Medical Corps and he succeeded Lieutenant-Colonel RAH Fulton to command it in 1939 with the rank of major. This was at a time when the Corps was regarded as an infantry reserve rather than as a training body for doctors and dentists. Later his health broke down and he was succeeded by Lieutenant-Colonel CE Hercus in 1941. Outside the medical profession he had wide church interests and was an elder of the First Church, chairman of Knox College Council, member of Corstorphine Home Committee, chairman of Nurses’ Memorial Fund and honorary physician to the Ross Home.

Known to all he taught as ‘Ipecac’, Douglas Iverach was a man of total dedication and integrity whose unfailing courtesy and consideration gained him both the respect and affection of his colleagues and students. Dr Iverach married Zealandia Ross who predeceased him by some years. They had no family.