2022 Distinguished Alumni Award Winner
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renatal diagnosis broke me and writing healed me,” says Dr. Margaret (Malgorzata) Nowaczyk Vic 8T5. She’s speaking of her 2021 book, Chasing Zebras: A Memoir of Genetics, Mental Health and Writing, which explores the challenges and significance of her work in medicine. “A big part of my practice is prenatal genetics, where making a diagnosis may open up the question of whether to continue a pregnancy. That weighs heavily on me,” she says. As a clinical geneticist at McMaster Children’s Hospital, Dr. Nowaczyk must deal regularly with gut-wrenching discussions involving the families of unborn or newly born children—ones who will either not survive, or survive with serious mental and physical limitations. Writing became her therapy, a way to work through these struggles. “When I discovered creative writing and narrative medicine 12 years ago, I was able to pour out these emotions and difficulties on a piece of paper and then share it with people,” says Dr. Nowaczyk. “It became so important to my mental well-being, and something I wanted to highlight in my book.” As a teenager in 1981, Dr. Nowaczyk came to Canada from Poland with her family. Speaking little English, they were high on hopes but short on contacts and
financial resources. Despite this traumatic transition, Dr. Nowaczyk rapidly mastered the language and started at Victoria College in 1982, majoring in biochemistry. “It was a privilege to attend,” she says. “Vic has great opportunities, resources, professors and libraries— I took full advantage of everything.” (As a writer, she is especially proud to have attended the same college as Margaret Atwood!) She went on to study medicine at U of T, where she met her husband, followed by a fellowship at the Hospital for Sick Children. Dr. Nowaczyk has 123 peer-reviewed publications to her name, some in top journals like Science and Nature Genetics. She has mentored numerous trainees, and is now a full professor of medicine at McMaster University. She still sees patients daily, caring for children with genetic disorders and providing prenatal diagnosis and genetic counselling for adults.
2022 Emerging Leader Award Winners Victoria Haldane Vic 1T2 is a rising voice in global public healthcare, advocating for equity, human rights and community engagement. Her graduate research has spanned reproductive health services in rural India to access to tuberculosis care in Tibet, producing policy-relevant evidence for highquality care. During the pandemic, Victoria played a key role in infection prevention and control training in the Philippines and Sri Lanka, assisting the World Bank and WHO on their responses. She has co-authored papers in the Lancet, the British Medical Journal and Nature Medicine.
As a Vic student, Nirmala Ramprasad Vic 1T4 co-founded Green Dupatta, a charity dedicated to sustainable development and agriculture. She did her MA at U of T, focusing her research on the suicide epidemic in Guyana. As president of Green Dupatta, Nirmala spearheads global community projects and educational initiatives, from restoring an abandoned building into a community centre in Guyana to constructing water harvesting and filtration systems in India. Nirmala is also the lead planner for her organization’s annual gala, using the event to showcase local youth talent and celebrate Caribbean culture.
A graduate of Vic One’s Stowe-Gullen stream, Esther Vlessing Vic 1T6 was well aware of the challenges a pandemic could bring to healthcare systems. When Ontario’s hospitals urgently needed isolation gowns, she jumped into action, planning a nationwide manufacturing response and then cofounding Canada Emergency Medical Manufacturers (CEMM). Ultimately, CEMM delivered over one million reusable isolation gowns to Ontario Health, the University Health Network and long-term-care homes. Esther’s efforts helped protect frontline workers while employing 550 people across the province. VIC REPORT AUTUMN 2023
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