Dr Rowan is a Specialist Physician in Addiction Medicine and an experienced Medical Administrator. Dr Rowan is a former President of both the Queensland branch of the Australian Medical Association and the . Dr Rowan has advocated for: improving services to reduce the economic and associated health care costs of illicit drug use as well as alcohol dependency disorders; the development of private-public healthcare partnerships; and improving rural and regional health services. Dr Rowan was previously the Deputy Chief Medical Officer for Uniting Care Health and Director of Medical Services at St Andrew's War Memorial Hospital. He has also worked as a Director of Medical Services and Medical Superintendent in rural and regional Queensland, predominantly in South-West Queensland but also on the Darling Downs. Dr Rowan helped with establishment of the as a part of the national medical education training framework, and he also served on the RVTS Board. He is a Fellow of the , the , the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine and the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners. Dr Rowan has also advocated about the growing public health problems of over-the-counter codeine misuse and the emergence of new synthetic drugs.
Political career
Dr Rowan was first elected to the Queensland Parliament on 31 January 2015 in the seat of Moggill at the Queensland State Election defeating the then Labor candidate Louisa Pink with 58.2 per cent of the two-party preferred vote after preferences. He was a Deputy Chair of the Health, Communities, Disability Services and Domestic and Family Violence Prevention Committee in the 55th Queensland Parliament. Dr Rowan is a conservative and in the centre right of the Liberal-National Party. He has spoken publicly about defending the right of democratic free speech. Dr Rowan is a former Shadow Minister for Environment & Heritage Protection and a previous Shadow Minister for National Parks & the Great Barrier Reef. In 2015 Rowan called for a public debate on capital punishment for terrorism related offences in Australia. Following the Queensland state election held on 25 November 2017, Dr Rowan was appointed the Shadow Minister for Communities, the Shadow Minister for Disability Services & Seniors, the Shadow Minister for Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Partnerships and the Shadow Minister for the Arts. In 2018 Dr Rowan opposed termination of pregnancy law reform in Queensland arguing that the legislation had significant flaws, including inadequate coercion and domestic violence protections.
