The Northern Medical Program celebrated its ninth graduation class this past May. The Class of 2016 is moving on to the next stage of training – two to seven years of residency (depending on specialty). Meet some of our recent graduates!.

Jolene Hall

Hometown:  Yellowknife, NT

What have you enjoyed the most about your MD undergraduate experience?
I have loved training in Prince George!! We have the technology to have UBC lectures in a smaller community that really loves and supports the program. We have had amazing, knowledgeable local preceptors and teachers. Being a smaller class it was easy to get all the hands on experience we need to feel confident to practice as residents. This last four years has been so fun filled, and exciting!!

What has surprised or challenged you in medical school?
I am surprised at how much we grow and change in only 4 very short years. The capabilities and knowledge I've acquired is astonishing to me.  I'm also surprised how much confidence medical school has instilled in me. I never played soccer before, and thanks to my colleagues starting an intramural team I'm now playing on 3 teams 5-6 days a week!  The challenge of course was navigating clerkship with little sleep and plenty of work to do!

What advice would you offer to upcoming students to the UBC MD Program?
I would have to say it would be to direct your learning from the start. Ask questions!! Medical school is an amazing time to ask experts their opinions!! Choosing a smaller program especially the NMP I have had countless opportunities to learn from the best in their fields, and gain experience dealing with a wide variety of health issues. Another thing I'm pretty passionate about is work-life balance!! You can't take care of others if you don't take care of you!

What's next for you?
I will be doing a two year family practice residency at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine in Sault Ste. Marie. I'm excited to go on an adventure out east!! I think it's healthy to get new perspectives, but I look forward to returning in two years to northern BC!!

Randi Woodbeck

Hometown: Houston

What have you enjoyed the most about your MD Undergraduate experience?
Getting to travel and meet people from all walks of life has been the greatest privilege. No matter where I go I am consistently amazed by how resilient people can be and how graciously they have shared with me the most intimate details of their lives so that I might learn something. They have told me stories of overcoming addiction, let me deliver their baby, examine their sick child, close their wounds… It has all been an extremely humbling experience.

What has surprised or challenged you in medical school?
Medical school can get a bit lonely sometimes. Over the last two years I have spent time in several BC communities, Alberta, and even Halifax and St. John’s. That’s not to mention the CaRMS tour that took us all back and forth across the country again in a 3-week period. While living out of a suitcase there were several times where I went out to dinner alone or even went to movies by myself. I think learning to be comfortable spending so much time alone has been one of medical school’s most unexpected challenges.

What advice would you offer to upcoming students in the UBC MD program?
1)    I know this is cliché, but seriously enjoy the journey! We all want so much to graduate and to match to our dream specialty. It can be easy to fall into a pattern of fixating on the end goal and losing sight of all the amazing medicine you are learning and the privilege you have to be where you are today. So just know that you are going to pass your exams and you are going to match to a residency. Breathe and be here now.
2)    A wise resident once told me that the worst thing you can do is to treat clerkship like a field trip. Make yourself an important part of the health care team and take ownership of the patients you are caring for. There will soon be a day when the responsibility is all yours so you might as well get used to it now.
3)    Finally, choose the specialty that will make you most happy, the one where you can close your eyes and picture yourself thirty years from now still kicking butt and teaching a posse of young medical students. 

What's next for you?
I will be starting a 5-year residency program in General Pathology in Calgary in July. Pathology is one of the oldest medical specialties around. Sir William Osler wrote, “As is your pathology, so is your medicine.” I love the thrill of making a diagnosis and will go to the ends of the Earth to provide the best diagnostic service for my patients and their clinicians!