While most of us know him as Apple City Family Medicine's Dr Luscombe, for a long time it was Officer Luscombe, while the young doctor served with the Australian Army.

In both peacekeeping efforts and conflicts in the UK, Europe, the Pacific Islands and Asia, Dr Luscombe served the troops as a practitioner, including a 12-month stint during the Vietnam War.

Dr Luscombe was in Saigon when the city was falling, while his wife Jane was at home in Adelaide with their two young children Tom and Georgina Luscombe.

He said war as a medic was as you'd expect "treating young boys, a long way from home" for a lot of gastrointestinal infections, colds and skin diseases.

After the war, the young family relocated to London while Dr Luscombe worked as an exchange officer with the British Army.

Following their stint in the UK, the Luscombes set up a private practice in Sydney, where the general practitioner focused on gastroenterology, cardiovascular and respiratory disease, diabetes and paediatrics.

Dr Luscombe said three things brought them to Orange: the Communist Revolution in China, the Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide and a pizza place.

Mrs Luscombe found a pizza restaurant in the Guide so good all the Italian chefs would dine out there, and the couple began joining them every Friday night.

On a night out with the restaurant hoards they got chatting to a couple with a connection to Orange.

The wife was part of the Russian Orthodox community who had moved to the region from Shanghai during the revolution.

"'Come to Orange for FOOD Week' they told us'," Dr Luscombe said.

With 11 years now under the belt, Dr Luscombe will officially hang up the stethoscope with a send off at the CWA Hall in Robertson Park on Sunday.

Former patients and members of the community are invited to join the celebration with friends and family from 2-4pm.

And what do you do after 50 years of doctoring?

"On Monday I made 2.5-kilograms of lime shred marmalade, I've got a veggie patch, chooks, I'm learning the piano," he said.

"I've got plenty on my plate."