University of Alberta

Darcy Belanger

Darcy Belanger is currently a third-year medical student and is completing this stage of his training through the Integrated Community Clerkship program at the University of Alberta. Having been born in Lac La Biche, and raised in Sturgeon County, he is no stranger to rural life and the many opportunities and challenges inherent to it. 

Prior to medical school, Darcy completed a bachelor’s degree in Kinesiology from the University of Alberta. While on campus, he was involved in student governance and community engagement through various positions held on the faculty’s student council. As a kinesiologist, Darcy believes exercise holds an important role in medicine and well-being. Darcy was able to practice as a Neuro-exercise Specialist at ReYu Paralysis Recovery Centre before beginning formal medicine education.

During summer months he has worked as a wildland firefighter with the Government of Alberta in the communities of Lac La Biche, Swan Hills, and Rocky Mountain House. This work experience allowed him to witness the strength, resilience, and generosity of many of Alberta’s most remote communities.

Recently, Darcy moved to the town of Peace River where he will be living and learning for the next nine months.

University of Calgary

Jezuina McDonald

Jezuina McDonald is a third-year medical student at the University of Calgary and is currently completing her training in the Longitudinal Integrated Clerkship Program in Crowsnest Pass.

Jesse grew up in a rural and remote community, Nakusp BC. This is the community that inspired her to pursue a career in rural medicine. Growing up in Nakusp, she benefited from the intersection of rurality, community, and health. She became interested in and passionate about health equity for rural and remote communities. Jesse values being an active member of the community and feels like the best version of herself in a rural context.

During medical school, Jesse has been an involved in advocacy for rural medicine in the Rural Medicine Interest Group at the University of Calgary and the Society of Rural Physicians of Canada Student Committee as the University of Calgary Liaison. 

Jesse holds a Bachelor of Health Science Degree in Biomedical Studies from UNBC and an advanced diploma in Rural Pre-Medicine from Selkirk College, which she pursued after her snowboard career ended due to injury. Her education focused on rural and Indigenous health and healing and more specifically, how teachings from the Indigenous paradigm can be incorporated into the biomedical model for a more inclusive approach to health care. She has worked at the Skookum Jim Friendship Center in Whitehorse and the Ki-Low-Na Friendship Society in Kelowna, specializing in Aboriginal supported child development and youth emergency shelter services. She has experience in youth facilitation around mental health and healing with northern Indigenous youth and has hosted circles at the Jackson Lake Healing Camp in the Yukon Territory. She has spent time in rural South Africa as a Project Assistant with the Sinovuyo Teens Project, which aims to develop an evidence-based parenting and teen program for youth and their families who are affected by HIV/AIDS. Prior to medical school, Jesse worked for the Interior Health Authority as the Coordinator of the Aboriginal Health Program.

Jesse feels honored to be recognized for her commitment to rural medicine and is excited about what the future will hold.

University of Alberta

Kirill Lissovskiy

Kirill Lissovskiy is currently a third-year medical student at the U of A. He was born in Kazakhstan and lived there until he immigrated to Canada with his parents, where the family settled in Drayton Valley.

During high school, Kirill was very involved with his community. From teaching courses on leadership and effective speaking to representing Canada internationally as part of an exchange program through the Royal Canadian Air Cadets. He also volunteered at the local continuous care facility as a Patient Care Assistant, which ignited his interest in health care.

Prior to medical school, he attended the University of Alberta, where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in Biological Sciences and a Master’s degree in Public Health. This led him to work with government and not-for-profit organizations on several community-centered initiatives, including the Fort McMurray wildfire recovery project.

Kirill’s interest in rural medicine can be traced back to his experiences living in rural communities in Alberta and elsewhere in the world. In addition to his time in Drayton Valley, he spent a number of summers of his childhood in rural Siberia with his grandparents.

During his first two years of medical school, he participated in shadowing opportunities in Sundre and Camrose, and completed a clinical elective in Grande Prairie. Kirill will spend the next year in Edson as part of the Integrated Community Clerkship program, where he will be working at the local clinic and hospital. Upon completing medical school, he hopes to work in Northern Alberta with the goal of incorporating his public health and health promotion experience into his medical practice.

Kirill is excited about practicing rural family medicine, where he can build long-lasting patient-physician relationships.

University of Calgary

Celia Walker

Celia Walker is currently in her third year of medical school at the University of Calgary, completing her training between her hometown of Calgary and her longitudinal integrated clerkship rural site, Rocky Mountain House. For Celia, rural family medicine fuses so many aspects of who she is into one career.

Celia spent most of her childhood summers in her mother’s hometown; a small community of roughly 500 people in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. This childhood connection to the East Coast led her to complete a BSc in biology and bioethics at Dalhousie University.

Celia has worked, studied and explored around the globe during her undergraduate degree and masters. Her interest in the intersection between ethics, medicine, and local and global health inequities led her to conduct her MSc in Global Health at McMaster University.

Following the completion of her MSc, Celia moved to Prince George, where she worked on a variety of research projects. Celia came to realize that Canada, especially rural, northern, and remote communities are not immune to the greatest global health challenges of the 21st century. It was then she decided to apply to med school so that she could serve the communities she was researching.

Celia shadowed physicians in many rural communities around Alberta, but it was after spending time in Rocky Mountain House that her desire to pursue a career in rural medicine was solidified. She values the intimate connection with rural communities, where she is exposed to the diversity of practice such as emergency medicine, obstetrics and Indigenous health.

Celia is an active environmentalist. She has been a member of Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment for five years, pioneered a film project on the health impacts of climate change in Canada and a project to integrate Planetary Health education into U of C curricula. Her work on climate and planetary health has further stoked her interest in – and connection to – rural medicine.

University of Alberta

Rodger Craig

There are a number of significant factors driving his pursuit of rural practice including: family interests, his own professional and intellectual interests and their alignment with rural practice, and finally, the opportunity to really be a part of a community and to serve and make meaningful contributions within that community.

Rodger and his wife both grew up within families that farmed and have lived in a number of small towns across both southern and northern Alberta, first as a junior hockey player and later as a rig-hand working in the oil and gas industry for Nabors Drilling.

Rodger is also drawn to the diversity of medicine that rural physicians practice, and the ability to work and provide care in a number of settings ranging from family clinic, to the emergency room, and even the operating room.

He is excited by the opportunities to pursue additional training in certain specialties, such as anesthesia or obstetrics, among others, to augment his skills and learning, and provide services that help meet the specific needs of a community.

Rodger and his family recently moved to Sylvan Lake to complete his third-year core clinical rotations as part of the U of A’s rural Integrated Community Clerkship program. 

University of Calgary

Chantal Serwatkewich

Chantal is in her third-year of medical school at the University of Calgary. Growing up she always wanted to be a physician and after high school she took nursing as her undergraduate degree and in 2009 completed her Bachelor of Nursing at Mount Royal College.

Chantal was born and raised in Fernie, BC and worked as a rural RN for nine years before applying and being accepted to the medical program at the University of Calgary in 2018. She enjoys living and working in a rural community and the challenges it brings on a day-to-day basis. As an RN she practiced in the ER, medical and surgical, labor and delivery, and palliative care nursing.

As a physician, she hopes to continue this and work in small communities in southern Alberta and BC. Chantal would also like to do some work in remote communities in northern Canada. She loves living and working in the same community and getting to know her patients on a more personal level. Being a rural family physician brings a diverse array of opportunities and looks forward to experiencing all that rural medicine has to offer.

She has completed electives in rural family medicine in both Alberta and BC and is currently participating in the UCLIC program in Crowsnest Pass.

Being able to live and work in such a great community close to where I grew up is a wonderful opportunity and feels very honored to receive this bursary as it will significantly help her continue with her studies.

She is very grateful to the Alberta Medical Association for the Tarrant Scholarship and for this generous opportunity for future rural physicians.

Pictured from left to right:

• Mrs. Jean Tarrant,
• Allison Farfus (University of Calgary),
• Meaghan Ryan (U of C),
• David Edgeworth (University of Alberta),
• Deanna Fernandes (U of A), and
• Dr. Edward Aasman, President, Section of Rural Medicine. 

University of Alberta

David Edgeworth

David was raised on a farm northwest of Grande Prairie. Since the age of 15, he has been volunteering in his community as a firefighter and medical co-responder.

Being a first responder showed him first-hand the frustrations of managing acute trauma and chronic illness away from urban centers. This rural upbringing ignited his passion for rural medicine.

Rural and remote is where David is happiest – enjoying the wide-open prairies and mountains. While growing up on the farm and at the fire hall, he learned the immense value of being a generalist – and in medical school, he learned this is an attribute exemplified by rural health care practitioners.

David is excited to begin clerkship in Whitecourt, which will give him the opportunity to experience broad-scope medicine. Although he is not sure what rural area he hopes to settle in, he feels returning to a rural setting is definitely in his future.

Deanna Fernandes

Deanna grew up on a cattle farm near Athabasca. She began spending time volunteering at the hospital and long-term care centre, where she found her passion for providing care to those in need. After finishing high school, she completed a Bachelor of Science degree at the U of A and continued to follow her passion for rural and remote care by participating in international volunteer trips to rural Ecuador and Guatemala to assist in constructing clean-burning stoves for families in need.

ln her first three years of medical school, Deanna participated in multiple rural medical skills weekends in northern Alberta locations and became the co-leader of the U of A Rural Medicine Interest Group. She created a rural mentorship program for U of A students interested in rural medicine, while continuing to shadow doctors in Athabasca. ln her third year of medical school, she spent 10 months in Whitecourt, where she was able to learn rural medicine from experienced rural and remote doctors.

Moving into her final year of medical school, Deanna plans to continue her education in rural medicine by doing multiple electives in rural care and applying to a rural residency program. Her future aspirations are to work as a family physician in a northern Alberta community, with a special interest in women’s health and emergency medicine.

University of Calgary

Allison Farfus

Alison was born in Crowsnest Pass and lived there for over 18 years. She completed her undergraduate degree in biological sciences at the University of Lethbridge and then moved to Calgary to pursue her medical education at the U of C.

Throughout medical school, she was involved in rural family medicine initiatives and has completed over 30 hours of rural family medicine shadowing in pre-clerkship. She is one of the Rural Medicine Interest Group representatives for her medical class and has planned many rural events including a backcountry medicine and first aid course and rural skills weekends.

Allison organized this year’s Rural High School Outreach Program to promote medicine as a career for rural youth and attended several rural medicine conferences including Calgary’s Cabin Fever Rural Medicine Conference and the Society of Rural Physicians of Canada Rural and Remote Conference in Newfoundland. She received the John N. Hnatiuk Rural Medical Student Bursary in 2018.

Allison completed the majority of her clerkship elective experiences in rural hospitals in Canada, including the Crowsnest Pass (University of Calgary), Mindemoya (Northern Ontario School of Medicine) and Mackenzie (University of British Columbia). She looks forward to the day she can return to a rural community as a rural physician.

Meaghan Ryan

Six years ago, Meaghan completed her undergraduate chemistry degree in Nova Scotia and never thought she would come to Calgary or go to medical school. She applied for a teaching aid position in the Northwest Territories and at 22 years old, she moved to Hay River and realized her passion for working in a rural environment and the spirit of being in a remote community. She wanted to stay in the north and found a Master in Public Health program through the University of Waterloo, which would allow her to complete almost all of her degree online.

Meaghan spent another year and a half working in Hay River while completing her Master’s coursework, and then moved to Prince Albert for a practicum with Northern lnter-Tribal Health. This experience working with remote, northern reserves continued to build her interest and passion for working with and in rural communities. After completing her work term and degree, she returned to the Northwest Territories to start a job with Population Health in Yellowknife, where she continued working on remote community health projects. She has also completed a general surgery elective in Whitehorse and will be completing a longitudinal clerkship in Yellowknife.

Meaghan’s dream is to bring her passion and experience in education and rural health to providing excellent, in-community rural surgical care.