The Collaborative Mentorship Network for Chronic Pain & Addiction (CMN) addresses the urgent need of local treatment options within primary care settings by building capacity within family physicians and multidisciplinary team members. The CMN provides helpful resources and opportunities for peer-to-peer support in the areas of chronic pain and substance use. To learn more, watch…
Read MoreChronic Pain – It’s Not About the Cure, It’s About the Context
“Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey.” – Marcel Proust All people feel pain; pain is unavoidable. Yet for some, pain is an uninvited dictator in their lives. It taunts and angers them from the beginning to the end of each…
Read MoreA Patient’s Journey with Pain – Finding HELP AB
Tracy Fossum has been in a long-term relationship with chronic pain for as long as she can remember. Through the years, Tracy’s pain became harder to manage. “I felt very unstable. I didn’t know what it meant and where it was going… I didn’t understand what was happening to me.” Even with increasing pain, Tracy…
Read MoreHeart of Family Medicine Podcast – Episode 16
Allan Bailey: Applying systems thinking to the heart of family medicine Having started his professional career as a civil engineer, Dr. Allan Bailey quickly realized that his astute problem-solving and systems thinking skills could quickly be transplanted into a different sector—health care. Realizing his childhood dream, Dr. Bailey found a new path in family medicine…
Read More#VaccinesWork
June 21, 2021 | Joint statement from physicians and pharmacists on COVID-19 vaccination in Alberta Family physicians and pharmacists are working together to help with the vaccination rollout. Alberta Health has asked us to join forces to help promote the importance of getting vaccinated. As part of our joint campaign family physicians and pharmacists are…
Read MoreTruth and Reconciliation
Read June 2021 eNews Over the past few weeks, there have been distressing stories in the news about the tragic and sobering finding of 215 Indigenous children’s remains in a mass grave in B.C. and the senseless murder of the Afzaal family in Ontario who had gone for a simple walk on a pleasant evening….
Read MoreThe (em)Power of Pathways
Better Care for Patients: Learning from Jocelan Yeomans, Individual with Lived Experience By the age of 23, Jocelan Yeomans found herself married with three children. With a difficult childhood behind her, she felt overwhelmed and ill equipped at this stage of her life. Things took a turn when a friend introduced her to crack cocaine,…
Read MoreSpeaking on Stigma in Our Systems – How Can we Make Change?
I have been thinking a lot about stigma and its implications for people with substance use disorders and/or chronic pain. Stigma is defined as “an attribute or quality which significantly discredits one in the eyes of others.”[i] The Fear of StigmatizationAt a recent session of the Community of Practice for Housing and Harm Reduction, the…
Read MoreEarly Careers, Family Medicine: How to Manage Charting & Labs
Your early years in practice can feel overwhelming for different reasons: diving into your practice, keeping a schedule, and practising without supervision to name a few. This article aims to tackle some of those overwhelming aspects you might experience, and suggest strategies for mitigating them. One potentially blindsiding aspect can be Charting & Lab Follow-up. Maybe…
Read MoreA Message from the President – World Family Doctor Day
Read May 2021 eNews Recently I had the great fortune to directly observe a medical student obtaining a history from a patient of a fellow Alberta family physician in a clinical education setting. The patient was distraught, struggling to cope under challenging circumstances which had presented multiple times before. During the interview, through tears she…
Read MoreHeart of Family Medicine Podcast – Episode 15
Cathy Scrimshaw: Transitioning out of rural family practice after 30 years After more than 30 years of rural family practice and 28 years as a family doctor in the community of Pincher Creek, Dr. Cathy Scrimshaw reflects on her time in rural family practice—the significant patient relationships she’s developed over the years, what it has…
Read MoreApril – Message from the President
Read April 2021 eNews It is my pleasure to write my first of many President’s messages to you. On March 25, 2021, many of you joined us for our Annual Meeting of Members (AMM), during which Dr. Vishal Bhella, now our Past President, and the CFPC Leadership generously passed on the ACFP Presidency role to me…
Read MoreRhPAP Feature – The CMN Benefits for Rural Physicians
Learn more about the Collaborative Mentorship Network experience from rural physicians Drs. Janine Karpakis, Joseph Ojedokun, and Dino Smilijic and how it has provided them peer-to-peer support and resources for treating chronic pain and addiction. For the full article visit the RhPAP Website:
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