ALUMNI NEWS | UBC MEDICINE 27
ISLAND MEDICAL PROGRAM
IAN COURTICE, MD’84 / MAA IMP REPRESENTATIVE
Victoria and several other health care facilities on Vancouver Island are the home of the Island Medical Program (IMP), one of the two distributed sites created by the UBC Faculty of Medicine in 2004. The IMP consisted of 24 students for the first four cohorts and was expanded to 32 students, which was the number of students who graduated from this program in 2015, part of the 61st graduating class of the UBC Faculty of Medicine. The first decade of leadership for the IMP was provided by a persuasive and persistent individual, Dr. Oscar Casiro, a pediatrician by training who graduated in Medicine in Argentina. He became a leader in undergraduate medical
education in Winnipeg, but Dr. Casiro faced considerable cynicism as to the probability of success in bringing undergraduate medical education to Vancouver Island. It was shown that many senior residents were thriving in Nanaimo. But could a small group of medical students really receive adequate undergraduate medical training in a place more known for its high tea, Birkenstocks and Cowichan sweaters? The clinical faculty, otherwise known as the practicing clinicians of Victoria and “up the island,” have come to embrace undergraduate medical training, proving that a medical program in Victoria could be successful. This was largely thanks to the cohesive and often understated manner in which Dr. Casiro ensured
Approximately 200 Victoria and Vancouver Island community physicians welcomed the IMP’s newest students at the Victoria Medical Society and Medical Staff Association South Island’s Student Welcome Reception.
that the University of Victoria, Island Health and the clinical faculty collaborated to provide top-notch academic and clinical education for the IMP students. The cohesion has been reinforced every January when the Victoria Medical Society and Island Health medical staff host a welcome reception for the IMP students as they arrive for their first (for many of them) taste of “island life.” Advances in videoconference technology have enhanced the efficacy of “distance education” and enables the IMP students to participate effectively in Vancouver-based lectures and other educational opportunities.
baton was passed to Dr. Bruce Wright, whose task is to ensure that the next decade produces the same quality of students who will remain on Vancouver Island to enter practice as fully-qualified specialists and family physicians. Even now, as some IMP graduates return to the Island as newly-minted clinical faculty, we can see them continue the tradition of supporting the IMP.
Dr. Casiro astutely guided the program through its first decade and with his retirement in June 2014, the
Victoria Medical Society and the Medical Staff Association along with Island Health and UBC Alumni co-sponsored the Student Welcome Reception.