QMA Excellence Awards
2013 QMA Awards: Recognizing the Leadership and Commitment of Physicians
The QMA had the great honour on April 20, 2013, of recognizing and awarding three physicians and four students who have distinguished themselves through their leadership and contribution to improve health care services. They are:
Teaching-Clinician Award
This award recognizes the exceptional commitment of a physician to training future physicians in Québec. This year, two physicians tied for this award.
Dr. Dominique Shum-Tim
Associate Professor, Department of Surgery
McGill University, Montréal
Dr. Dominique Shum-Tim is an active member of the prestigious American Association for Thoracic Surgery, which is in recognition of his significant professional stature, exceptional clinical performance and significant contributions clinically and academically to the field. He is one of the youngest in this Association.
Dr. Shum-Tim is also an active member of many prestigious surgical societies such as the Society of Thoracic Surgeons, American Heart Association, American College of Surgeons and Canadian Cardiovascular Society.
His reputation with the next generation of surgeons is already well established. He is a mentor and inspiring role mode for his students, who speak very highly of him.
His influence goes beyond the borders of Canada to as far away as China. His dedication to the Guiyang Medical School Affiliated Hospital in China, where he volunteers his surgeon’s skills and is also involved in training and modernizing the cardiac surgery unit, also deserves recognition. His commitment to the medical community in China has earned him the esteemed title of the modern day Norman Bethune – praise that certainly reflects his commitment.
Dr. Raquel del Carpio-O'Donovan
Professor and Vice Chair of Radiology
Associate Director of Radiology
McGill University, Montreal
Dr. del Carpio is most passionate about teaching. She is the only radiologist on the Faculty Honour List for Educational Excellence at McGill University, and was also recognized with Teacher of the Year Award in 1995-1996.
Each day, she makes a difference in the lives of many medical students, residents and fellows, not only in the McGill milieu but for many graduates from South America, the Middle East, Europe and Canada.
Her commitment and involvement for the next generation of physicians is undeniable. She has trained several generations of residents in radiology, and has mentored close to 100 international radiologists in the neuroradiology section of the McGill hospitals over the last 20 years.
Outside her many administrative functions and teaching duties, she also finds time to be the Latin American Coordinator for the Global Outreach Program of the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine, and the Canadian representative to the Interamerican College of Radiology.
Prestige Award
The Prestige Award is the greatest distinction paid to a physician by the Québec Medical Association. An annual award, it acknowledges the physician’s excellence and major contribution to the advancement of medicine and society in humanitarian, ethical, scientific and educational fields.
Dr. Stanley Vollant
The first Aboriginal surgeon in Québec, Dr. Stanley Vollant has completely dedicated himself to First Nations health and education for the last few years. An example of his work is the First Nations youth career and health camps, a unique project that encourages education while allowing young Aboriginal people to become familiar with careers in health care.
A spiritual person, Dr. Vollant once walked the Way of St. James to Compostela, an endeavour that no doubt inspired him for his latest initiative, the Innu Meshkenu (Innu Trail). This new project illustrates his great courage and strong potential to mobilize First Nations communities, but also demonstrates his real desire to make the entire Québec population aware of prevention and the importance of a healthy lifestyle.
Devoted to his personal and professional efforts, Dr. Vollant has shown deep humanism by expressing his wish to dedicate a good part of his professional and personal life to the health of his community. Despite his very busy schedule, he still finds the energy to sit on a number of committees and to be a guest speaker at many symposia and conferences. He was elected president of the QMA from 2001 to 2003.
When speaking of professionalism and social commitment, Dr. Vollant embodies every part of this aspect of a physician. He is a model of perseverance for youth and an inspiration for the entire medical community.
Scholarships
The QMA is proud again this year to partner with TD Insurance Meloche Monnex in awarding scholarships to students from our faculties of medicine. The recipients stand out for their academic and community leadership. Their commitment is essential for the good health of Québec society and that of university life.
Martin Pelletier, junior extern, Université Laval
Very active in the student life of his faculty, Martin Pelletier puts his organizational and leadership talents to good work. He founded the Groupe d’Intérêt en Santé Publique (public health interest group).
Sponsored by the Regroupement des Associations d'Étudiantes et d'Étudiants en Sciences de la Santé de l'Université Laval (health sciences student associations group), the public interest health group offers lunch-time conferences and interdisciplinary awareness theme days, including topics such as organ donation, or the role of the health professional in suicide prevention.
Mr. Pelletier also devotes his efforts and talents to another big project. With two medical colleagues, he founded Cours ta réussite. The goal of this project is to help reduce the dropout rate among youth who are struggling and encourage them to complete their education. The project instigators help these youth develop control over their lives by taking up the colossal challenge of running in the Marathon des deux rives. An interdisciplinary team is there to support, coach and motivate the participants.
The first edition had some very successful results. Twenty participants completed their school year and 12 of them ran the marathon or half-marathon. In addition, the participants and volunteers had a wonderfully enriching human experience.
Cours ta réussite has become a not-for-profit organization and Mr. Pelletier is now working on ensuring the longevity of this project.
Laura Marie Drudi, fourth year medical student, McGill University
Upon realizing that the undergraduate program did not devote much time to vascular surgery, Ms. Drudi became actively involved in promoting this specialty, especially since the demand in this field has been rising as the population ages and more people are dealing with cardiovascular problems.
Ms. Drudi developed several awareness initiatives for medical students. She founded the McGill Vascular Surgery Interest Group that fosters presentations, workshops and discussions among its 60 members.
She also created the Vascular Surgery Interest Group toolkit that is distributed in all the faculties of medicine in Canada and the US.
In addition, Ms. Drudi is an active participant in the events of the Society of Vascular Surgery, which allows her to network with vascular surgery professors and industry representatives. As such, she is collaborating in designing a teaching program for medical students and residents. The program will be presented at the Vascular Annual Meeting to be held in San Francisco in May.
Laurence Jobidon, second year student, Université de Sherbrooke
Ms. Jobidon has distinguished herself during her studies, and has also demonstrated exceptional leadership. In collaboration with SCORE-IFMSA (an international association), she set up the Comité d’intérêt en Recherche (research interest committee), whose mission is to demystify and promote medical research. Through its many events and activities, the committee inspires curiosity, respect and a more humanistic vision of medical research among medical students.
Besides her medical studies and her projects and interest in research, she finds the time to contribute to Parlons-Science (Let’s Talk Science). This project consists of medical and scientific workshops in primary schools to engage young minds in science. She has also started two research pilot projects sponsored by professors in community health.
In addition, in her free time she organized the first musical comedy put on by the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences at Université de Sherbrooke: Moulin Rouge. Excited by this project, students from all the health science programs were involved in the production. Through this, she successfully brought to life one of the Faculty’s values: interprofessional collaboration.
Robert Gourdeau Award
This award is conferred on one of the four scholarship recipients of the year to acknowledge their sense of initiative and leadership throughout their medical training, as well as their extensive social and community commitment.
Anne-Sophie Thommeret-Carrière, first year clerkship, Université de Montréal
Being a leader is being able to identify the needs of others and to respond to them while also inspiring other people to do the same.
Ms. Thommeret-Carrière is the co-founder and co-ordinator of INcommunity, an immersion project aimed at training the best physicians, and especially to raise their awareness of the reality of forgotten populations, while also focusing on collaboration and communication between the community and medical environments.
The premise of INcommunity is: the problem of access to the health care system experienced by disadvantaged populations is largely due to health professionals’ lack of understanding of these populations and to a lack of co-ordination between the communities and the health services. This project aims to overcome this obstacle.
Ms. Thommeret-Carrière has done enormous work to get these immersions set up, involving numerous meetings with stakeholders in the communities, writing a collection of articles and training participants.
Her efforts have been extremely successful. This student initiative is now its third year. INcommunity offers four areas of immersion: Aboriginal health, immigrants’ health, the health of offenders, and urban health. The immersion options are offered in Montréal, Sherbrooke, Chicoutimi and in the Aboriginal communities of Pessamit and Natashquan.
In addition to standing out in Québec for this project, she also has a spotlight on the Canadian scene and even internationally. In fact, her participation and project were mentioned at the Family Medicine Forum in 2011, she was a 2012 Forces Avenir finalist, and finally, INcommunity will be introduced in London in the summer of 2013. INcommunity, under the auspices of the International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations, now offers support for students who wish to introduce a similar initiative in other countries.
Call for Nominations : QMA excellence awards 2013
Like each year, the Quebec Medical Association (QMA) wishes to give special recognition to physicians who have stood out in their work environment, both by the leadership they have shown and their contribution to the improvement of health care.
The 2012 QMA Awards: Recognizing leadership and physician involvement
At an event attended by the Minister of Health and Social Services, Dr. Yves Bolduc, the QMA had the great honour on April 20 and 21, 2012, to recognize and award three physicians and four students who have distinguished themselves through their leadership and contribution to improve health care services. They are:
QMA awards : recognizing exceptional physicians
At an event attended by the Minister of Health and Social Services, the QMA had the great honour on April 16, 2011, to recognize and award six physicians and four students who have distinguished themselves through their leadership and contribution to improve health care services. They are:
QMA excellence awards
Every year, the Québec Medical Association (QMA) honours physicians for their outstanding achievements in different fields of activity or who have demonstrated an exceptional commitment within their community or association.