The Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA) was set to be host to 27 first-year medical students from Western University’s Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry (London and Windsor Campus) for Discovery Week 2022.
Taking place May 24 to May 27, Discovery Week provides a unique learning opportunity by placing first year medical students in rural and regional healthcare settings.
This will be CKHA’s 15th time participating in Discovery Week, hospital officials say.
This year also marked the first time that the hospital has participated since 2019, prior to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We are so pleased to welcome back medical students to CKHA for Discovery Week,” said Lori Marshall, President and CEO, CKHA, in a media release.
“This unique learning opportunity provides positive exposure to rural hospitals like CKHA, and has brought back many of the participating medical students to Chatham-Kent to complete electives during their third and fourth year of medical school.”
Discovery Week originally started as part of a strategy to attract doctors to set up practice in rural and regional locations.
Research shows that students begin making career decisions early in their medical school careers.
Discovery Week is designed to expose students to practicing medicine outside of large urban areas before they make firm plans for their careers.
“CKHA is thrilled to welcome a record number of students for Discovery Week. This initiative is a fantastic opportunity to showcase our community to future physicians,” said Dr. Pervez Faruqi, Chief of Staff, CKHA, in a press release.
“Our medical education program has grown in recent months with many of our physicians joining the preceptor ranks at Schulich School of Medicine. We can’t thank these physicians enough for dedicating their time to teaching students their expertise.”
Students had the opportunity to shadow family physicians, specialists, nurse practitioners and allied healthcare professionals in many areas of Chatham-Kent to determine what a typical workday entails.
In addition to the clinical education component of the week, students participated in social events each evening to experience firsthand some of the many amenities offered in Chatham-Kent.
