Discussions

This year, instead of celebrating Resident Doctors Awareness Week, we are simply celebrating and appreciating resident doctors. Given where we are, now two years into a global pandemic, we couldn’t possibly pack all the appreciation you deserve into a single week. Instead, we would like to let you know that we understand what you are going through and we are here for you.

I was recently talking to a young family doctor in Toronto who told me he was finishing his charting at midnight. I couldn’t believe it because I am home every day at 5:00 p.m. with no homework.

University Avenue—a major hospital thoroughfare—was empty with the exception of staggered police cars and diagonal buses to prevent large trucks from getting through, with just enough space for an ambulance to slowly squeeze by.

‘I’m not going to sugarcoat this,’ says Dr. Melissa Yuan-Innes. ‘Medicine is the toughest I’ve seen right now. But I’m still grateful for it.’

Doctors: Take our weekly poll.

In the past I served on the board at the Ontario Pharmacists Association, spending about six years dedicated to voicing issues relevant to the practice of pharmacy. Along the way I have used my blog to highlight issues, promote discussion, and encourage involvement in promoting change. 

We’re clinical providers who have implemented vaccination programs from the time they were first available, and we recognize how profoundly vaccines reduce the severity of COVID-19. Based on our experiences running vaccine programs, we have concerns about the use of increasingly punitive policies towards people who remain unvaccinated.

For the majority of Canadians, COVID-19 vaccinations represent the restoration of some measure of order in their lives after the pandemic turned the world upside down in March 2020.