Ruth Stewart

Ruth Stewart

Clinical Instructor, UBC Department of Psychiatry

Email: ruth.stewart@vch.ca

Galilee Thompson

Clinical Instructor, UBC Department of Psychiatry

Email: galilee.thompson@alumni.ubc.ca

John-Jose Nunez

Clinical Instructor, UBC Department of Psychiatry

Email: johnjose.nunez@ubc.ca

Call for Nominations: Killam Teaching Prizes 2025 | Deadline: January 31, 2025

Faculty of Medicine Internal Deadline: Friday, January 31st, 2025 12:00pm

UBC Killam Teaching Prizes are UBC’s most prestigious teaching awards. The Prizes recognize excellence in teaching in the medical and science undergraduate programs, residency programs, school and graduate programs within the Faculty of Medicine. The Prizes are awarded annually, and are supported by the UBC Killam Endowment Fund.

Overview | Nomination Form | Previous Recipients
Contact: Office of the Vice Dean, Education (med.vdeadmin@ubc.ca)

More info: UBC Office of the Provost & VP Academic

VFMP Faculty: Registration open for Teacher Certificate programs 2024-2025

Dear VFMP Colleagues,

We invite you to register for a series of online teacher development workshops provided as a collaboration between the Regional Faculty Development Sites (Island, Northern, Southern, and Vancouver-Fraser Medical Programs).

The Teacher Certificate Program (TCP) welcomes faculty who teach and assess in the MD Undergraduate Program (MDUP) across all sites:

  • TCP 1: Foundational Teaching is designed for all who teach in the MDUP. Five 1.5-hour sessions on facilitating active learning, building healthy learner relationships, and developing effective feedback and assessments. This certificate is eligible for CME credits.
  • TCP 2: Career Planning & Wellness is designed with particular attention to the career and personal development of clinical faculty who teach in the MDUP with topics like promotions for clinical faculty and planetary health.

Each session is delivered on Zoom from 5:30 – 7:00 PM and courses within each track can be taken in any order towards a certificate. If you miss a session this year, not to worry, we will likely have another session the following year!

Join us at our upcoming sessions:

TCP 1: Focus on Foundational Teaching

TCP 2: Focus on Career Planning and Wellness

Our programs aim to support you with your teaching and learning endeavours. Visit the VFMP Teacher’s Hub for other faculty development opportunities. Or please speak to us to explore ways we can work together including customized workshops and ways to share best practices with colleagues across the MD program. 

Kind regards,

VFMP Faculty Development
Faculty of Medicine | University of British Columbia
Gordon & Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre | Musqueam, Squamish & Tsleil-Waututh Traditional Territory
2775 Laurel Street, 11th Floor, Vancouver BC V5Z 1M9
vfmp.facdev@ubc.ca 
vfmpfacdev.med.ubc.ca/

CAAP Annual Conference – Psychiatry in a time of crisis: Paving the road to recovery | October 21 & 22

The Canadian Academy for Addiction Psychiatry (CAAP) is very excited to announce its inaugural Annual Conference to be held on October 21 & 22, 2024 at the Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue, SFU Campus, Vancouver, BC. The aim of this in-person event is to bring clinicians, academics and trainees together to share novel clinical approaches, research updates and more.

Learn more about the CAAP: Psychiatry in a time of crisis: Paving the road to recovery and register online here…

CAAP aims to address the growing challenges facing the healthcare system relating to addictions and concurrent disorders. This organization is comprised of psychiatrists and related professions who engage in relevant clinical and research activities. CAAP aims to:

  • Promote comprehensive and high quality evidence based practices for people living with substance use and concurrent disorders
  • Translate and disseminate evidence-based research to improve clinical practice and patient outcomes
  • Enhance addiction psychiatry training and careers in Canada
  • Connect with other global organizations to promote collaboration

Invitation to faculty | Presentation by Concurrent Disorders faculty recruitment candidate

Dear Department Faculty Members,

The UBC Department of Psychiatry is currently recruiting for a faculty position in the area of Concurrent Disorders at the rank of Assistant or Associate Professor. The Search Committee has recently reviewed the applications and shortlisted three candidates. The co-Chairs of the Search Committee would like to invite you to attend the virtual presentations by these candidates and provide your input.

The three presentations have been scheduled for the following Thursdays:

Schedule: Thursday, September 26, 2024 @ 9:00 to 10:00 am
Candidate: Dr. Pouya Rezazadeh-Azar
Title: Innovative Solutions for Mental Health, Pain, and Addiction Management in the Fentanyl Era

Schedule: Thursday, October 3, 2024 @ 9:00 to 10:00 am
Candidate: Dr. Victor Li
Title: Bridging the treatment gap for patients with concurrent disorders: reintegrating a marginalized population

Schedule: Thursday, October 10, 2024 @ 9:00 to 10:00 am
Candidate: Dr. Mohammadali Nikoo
Title: From Crisis to Care – Bridging Research and Practice to Address Evolving Challenges in the Field of Substance Use and Concurrent Disorders

Zoom Link:
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/62620773843?pwd=r3eVKq4BT2A79RhrttkSzgewKbw1jG.1
Meeting ID: 626 2077 3843
Passcode: 286392

Comments about the candidate can be emailed to Leah Ranada (leah.ranada@ubc.ca) following the presentation. As members of the Department, your attendance to these presentations and your subsequent feedback would be highly appreciated.

Sincerely,

Leah Ranada
Assistant Human Resources Manager
UBC Department of Psychiatry

Announcing the 2025/26 Grants for Catalyzing Research Clusters Competition

***Shared on behalf of Dr. Robert McMaster (Vice Dean, Research, Faculty of Medicine). Please cascade within your unit.***

We are pleased to announce the 2025/26 Grants for Catalyzing Research Clusters (GCRC) Competition.

The competition is open to new and returning clusters of research excellence in all disciplines at UBC Vancouver. Applicants may select a budget term of one or two years. Cluster leads must submit a notice of intent at https://apply.research.ubc.ca by November 1, 2024. Full applications are due January 8, 2025.

More information about this funding competition, the application process and upcoming information sessions on October 18 and 22 is available at www.research.ubc.ca/GCRC.

Grants are enabled by the UBC Vancouver Academic Excellence Funds in support of Research Excellence Strategy 6 (Collaborative Clusters) in UBC’s strategic plan.

Sincerely,

Gail Murphy
Vice-President,
UBC Research & Innovation

Gage Averill
Provost and Vice-President,
Academic, UBC Vancouver

We humbly acknowledge, with gratitude, that we live, work, and play as an uninvited guest on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil- Waututh) Nations. 

A Great Turnout at the 18th Annual Pacific Psychopharmacology Conference

The 18th Annual Pacific Psychopharmacology Conference, organized by the UBC Department of Psychiatry and UBC CPD, took place in downtown Vancouver on September 19th and 20th, 2024. The format was truly hybrid with some presenters and some attendees participating remotely. On Thursday afternoon, a total of 178 practitioners spent the afternoon learning from local experts about ADHD across the life cycle. On Friday, 192 attendees were on site at the Pinnacle Hotel Harbourfront, and 193 attended virtually.

Derek Thompson, Director, Indigenous Engagement for the UBC Faculty of Medicine, provided remarks for the conferees and speakers to open the meeting in advance of the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. Highlights of the day’s plenary sessions included Professor Stefan Leucht‘s presentation on recent meta-analytic studies in psychiatry. Professor Leucht, of the Technical University of Munich in Germany, is a world leader in such investigations, and he gave an intimate session in the afternoon for clinicians on understanding methods of meta-analysis. Dr. Andrea Iaboni from the University of Toronto provided updates in a plenary session on the Canadian guidelines for managing anxiety in older adults.

Other speakers included Dr. David Taylor of the Maudsley Hospital in London, UK, Dr. Benjamin Goldstein from CAMH in Toronto, and Dr. David Crockford from the University of Calgary. The conference has a goal of including high-quality speakers, both international and local, who can address important clinical topics across the spectrum of ages and disorders. Perspectives from people with lived experience have been included in recent years. The conference committee is co-chaired by Randall F. White and Reza Rafizadeh and includes Nick Mathew, Katelyn Halpape, Jackie Siu and William Mak. The committee is very grateful to the organizational and on-the-ground support from UBC CPD including conference director Lindsay Callan and manager Michelle Baysan. 

Next year’s conference will be in September. Look for the announcement of the exact date in early 2025.

Upcoming BCPA Award Nominations

** Sent on Behalf of Dr. Joseph Tham, Clinical Faculty Affairs Representative and Dr. Colleen Northcott, President, BC Psychiatric Association**

Dear Clinical Faculty colleagues,

I’m aware that many of us are member of the BC Psychiatric Association. Below is a call for nominations for their annual BCPA awards. BCPA Awards will be presented in November. Awardees must be BCPA members, so please connect with Colleen Northcott regarding the colleague you have in mind!


Each year at our Annual AGM & Education Day, we honour our BCPA members with awards. It is an excellent way to recognize each other for outstanding contributions to psychiatry. Please consider nominating a deserving member colleague for one of the following. Resident members can apply for the Resident Advocacy Awards. Click on the links for respective awards below to view an outline of the easy process to nominate. Note that the deadline approaches on October 16, 2024

  1. Distinguished Contribution to Psychiatry Award
  2. Outstanding Lifetime Community Service Award
  3. UBC Resident Advocacy Awards

Awards will be presented at the Annual AGM & Education Day on Saturday, November 16, 2024 at Vancouver UBC Robson Square (hybrid available). 

Remember to register at https://bit.ly/bcpa2024conference!


Best regards,

Joe Tham, MD, FRCPC
Clinical Associate Professor, UBC Department of Psychiatry
Clinical Faculty Affairs Representative

We humbly acknowledge, with gratitude, that we live, work, and play as an uninvited guest on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil- Waututh) Nations.