Roman Rossleigh said he had two birthdays: one when he was born in Krakow, Poland, on October 13, 1919; the other when he was liberated by the US Army from the Mauthausen concentration camp, Austria, on May 5, 1945. He celebrated the latter more, knowing then how precious life was.

For Rossleigh, who built a large migrant medical practice in Australia, life often hung by a thread during World War II, largely because he twice insisted on looking after his mother and sister when he might have avoided the horrors of the Russian and German occupations of Poland.

Roman Rossleigh, who has died at 87, grew up in Lodz. His father, Ludek, was a cardiologist who had been decorated for bravery while with the Polish Army's medical corps during the Russo-Polish War in 1920 and who was to rejoin the army in 1939. His mother, Lina, was a dermatologist who treated venereal disease in women.

Doctors were poorly paid in Poland then and Roman's parents had to borrow money in winter. In summer they fared better, working in the health resort of Krynica. Roman would visit them, returning with money to pay family debts.

Roman wanted to study medicine but was denied entry to medical school because the number of Jewish students was limited. Instead, he travelled to Pisa, learned Italian and studied first-year medicine. He did his second year in Lausanne, Switzerland, where he learned French.

When World War II broke out, he could have stayed in safe Switzerland but returned to Lwow, Poland, to look after his mother and his younger sister, Janka. Under the Russians, who had occupied eastern Poland, he spent two more years at medical school, but the Germans swept into Lwow in 1941. The family were non-practising Jews and Rossleigh had not been circumcised, which saved his life more than once when he was stopped at checkpoints.

In 1942 Rossleigh decided to make his way to London but could not bear his mother's distress at the railway station. He got off the train. In August 1942, the Gestapo took away his mother and grandmother. He never saw either woman again.

With false papers identifying him as Francis Tchaikovsky, a gentile, Rossleigh fled to Vienna, where he worked in a mental hospital. Betrayed by an informer in 1943, he was tortured by the Germans - hung up on a hook like an animal carcass for 24 hours with hands tied, permanently damaging his arms. He was beaten repeatedly, resulting in left-sided paralysis, which worsened over the years.

Rossleigh was incarcerated in Plaszow and then Mauthausen, where more than 100,000 inmates were murdered. Janka was sent to Auschwitz. Like Roman, she survived.

Rossleigh met his wife, Christine, who had lived precariously on false papers as a housekeeper for an SS officer, in Krakow in January 1946 while completing his medical studies. They married after knowing each other for three days. The marriage endured for 61 years.

Roman, Christine and Ludek, who was blinded by war injuries, migrated to Australia in 1947.

Rossleigh had to return to medical school, at the University of Sydney, before being registered as a medical practitioner in 1952. His large migrant practice in Newtown came from his quality as a doctor and his ability to speak seven languages. He undertook research on issues of migrant mental health and the utilisation of health services.

A tall, imposing man with an inquiring mind and a generous nature, passionate about history and classical music, he supported many good causes. He became a Christian - his mother's parents, he observed wryly, were Mary and Joseph - and a Freemason. He was heavily involved in the Polish community, an elected member of the Federal Council of Polish Associations in Australia, a vice-president of the Polish Cultural and Artistic Circle, the president of the football club Polonia-North Side, and club doctor for Apia Leichhardt.

When Rossleigh travelled to Poland in 1967 to arrange for Polish soccer players to come to Australia, a Polish official let slip that the Polish Communist Party was happy to send footballers to Australia because they could spy on the Polish community. Back in Sydney, Rossleigh called an extraordinary meeting of the Polonia Club. The Polish Consul promptly told him he would never be allowed into Poland again. Only in 1994, five years after the fall of communism, could he return. Travelling with Christine and their daughter, Monica, he was reunited with surviving family members and friends.

On the fall of communism, Rossleigh became an active member of the Solidarity with Poland Fund. The Polish government awarded him the Knight Cross of the Order of Merit and the Auschwitz Cross, which honour inmates of concentration camps. He was twice awarded the Polish Gold National Treasure Medal.

Although a patriotic Pole, he loved his new homeland. Cricket became a passion and he had unbounded faith in the Australian team, for their fighting qualities. "Mr Border will save us", he would announce, or "Mr McGrath will bowl them out".

Rossleigh is survived by his wife, Christine, daughter, Monica, son, Martin, and four grandchildren.

This is an edited version of the obituary that appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald on 9 October 2007.