Family Medicine Residency Site: Abbotsford-Mission

Experts from UVic and Island Health discuss safety, evidence, and patient impact of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare and research. Learn more and register here.

Happy New Year Team!

To kick off our 2026 Dawn Patrol Faculty Development Series, we’re starting with a topic that hits every exam room, every day. I’ve invited Sean McKelvey, BSc(Pharm) to share practical, evidence-informed insights on how food and lifestyle can meaningfully shift metabolic health, including the big question: can Type 2 diabetes remission be achieved through diet and lifestyle?

I had the opportunity to connect with Sean last year at our Curriculum Retreat, and I thought his presentation was fantastic and incredibly timely given how we’re trying to move in a direction that educates patients on the role of food and nutrients in their overall health. 

This faculty development session explores the science and practice of therapeutic nutrition in primary care. Learn evidence-based strategies to support patients in reversing chronic disease through sustainable, food-first approaches.

Session Title: Reversing Chronic Disease in Primary Care: A Food-First Prescription

Speaker: Sean McKelvey, BSc(Pharm), Chief Executive Officer, Institute for Personalized Therapeutic Nutrition (IPTN)

Learning Objectives:

• Understand the therapeutic nutrition model and remission criteria
• Review evidence and guidelines from Diabetes Canada and ADA/EASD
• Explore how interprofessional teams can safely support medication de-escalation
• Identify practical resources for patients and health professionals

Event Details:

📅 Friday, January 30, 2026
🕖 07:00–07:45 AM (Pacific Time)
📍 Virtual via Zoom: Email jacqueline.ashby@ubc.ca for link

Who Should Attend: Family physicians, preceptors, residents, nurse practitioners, and allied health professionals interested in integrating therapeutic nutrition into clinical teaching and patient care.

Hosted by: Dr. Jacqueline Ashby, UBC Faculty Development, Team-Based Primary Care Learning Centres (TPCLC)

Read the most popular JAMA articles in 2025 including coffee and AFib, osteoporosis, platelet transfusion, type 2 diabetes, S aureus bacteremia, septic shock, and more.

“Delivered through the Nova Scotia Health Authority, the program aims to break down systemic barriers that Black women often face when navigating the health-care system, according to Natalie Johnson, the program’s team lead and registered dietitian.

‘They’re able to come here and let some of those walls down, [be] able to open up about things that they may not be able to open up with a health-care provider who doesn’t get their experience as a Black woman,’ she said. 

MacKinnon said she’s working on healing both physically and psychologically from experiences of racism and discrimination she’s endured throughout her life. But within the traditional health-care system, she said clinicians rarely acknowledged how those experiences affected her overall health.”

Read more on How this team is transforming health care for African Nova Scotian women via CBC News.

ABSTRACT: Addressing barriers to cervical cancer screening as a public health priority in British Columbia requires innovative approaches. Community-based health promotion initiatives like Papapalooza connect the public with low-barrier cervical cancer screening and accessible health education, offering inclusive, celebratory, and trauma-informed Pap test experiences through pop-up events. 

To determine whether patients support Papapalooza as a strategy to reduce screening barriers, we administered 354 pre-Pap surveys and 309 post-Pap surveys to 533 Papapalooza attendees at five events held between March and June 2023. Identified barriers included inaccessible primary care, provider-related factors, and personal factors. Surveys showed increased knowledge and comfort accessing and understanding the importance of screening, with 93.8% of post-Pap survey participants “very likely” to attend another Papapalooza. 

Community-based health promotion is an acceptable means of connecting patients with important screening, while creating meaningful opportunities to enhance health literacy. 

Learn more here.

“This is not about a minor lapse in safety, it’s about a company that gives pedophiles powerful tools to prey on innocent and unsuspecting kids. The trauma that results is horrific, from grooming, to exploitation, to actual assault. In this case, a child lost her life. This needs to stop.” ~ Alexandra Walsh, Partner at Anapol Weiss via Anapol Weiss

Roblox looks like digital LEGO, but the risks are now big enough that attorneys general, researchers, and child protection advocates are sounding alarms.

Investigators using child avatars have repeatedly found sexualised content, grooming behavior, and harassment inside Roblox experiences, even with safety tools turned on (Revealing Reality, reported in The Guardian, 2025). The report also found the avatar belonging to the 10-year-old’s account could access ‘highly suggestive environments’ and another “test avatar registered to an adult was able to ask for the five-year-old test avatar’s Snapchat details using barely coded language”

Parents and several US states have sued Roblox for safety issues and making it too easy for predators to contact children (Kentucky Attorney General, 2025; Louisiana Attorney General, 2025; Texas Attorney General, 2025). A single plaintiffs’ firm (Anapol Weiss) reports it has filed 12 wrongful-death suits against Roblox, one explicitly involving a 13-year-old girl’s suicide after alleged extremist grooming; other suits involve different forms of exploitation. NSPCC and other child protection groups now list Roblox alongside social media when they brief parents about online risk (NSPCC, 2022).

So this is no longer a niche concern. For clinicians and parents, Roblox belongs in routine conversations about mood, sleep, and safety.

The warning signs and suggestions below are adapted from WHO and APA criteria for problematic gaming, systematic reviews on cyberbullying and adolescent mental health, and media-use guidance from the American Academy of Pediatrics, Canadian Paediatric Society, and NSPCC.

Children: Changes in Behaviour & Stress

These behavioural changes may appear in a child who is heavily engaged on gaming platforms:

• More irritable or tearful, especially when asked to log off
• Staying up late to play, trouble falling asleep, or nightmares
• Slipping grades, incomplete homework, loss of interest in offline activities
• Withdrawing from in person friends, relying mainly on gaming “friends”
• Hiding screens, constant headphones, refusal to play in shared spaces

Learn more in these symptoms via the American Psychiatric Association, via the WHO, and via The Canadian Centre for Child Protection.

Ideas for Parents & Guardians

1. Play once, then set rules together. Ask your child to show you their favourite games and who they play with.
2. Use the safety tools. Turn on parental controls, restrict chat and friend requests, limit spending, and keep devices in shared spaces when possible (Roblox Trust and Safety, 2025; NSPCC, 2022).
3. Anchor Roblox inside a family media plan. Protect time for sleep, schoolwork, exercise, and offline friends. The American Academy of Pediatrics has simple family media plan tools that can be adapted to any home you can access here.
4. Make disclosure safe. Explain to your child that If something weird or scary happens on their gaming platform to inform you because this information can help you keep them safe.

Three Questions Every Trainee Can Ask

You can integrate a digital media use conversation into a psychosocial history in under a minute:

1. “What games or apps do you use most, is Roblox one of them?”
2. “Who do you usually play with, people you know in real life or mostly people you only know online”
3. “Has anyone ever said or done something while playing the game that felt uncomfortable or scary”

A “yes” to that third question is your signal to slow down, explore, document, and involve safeguarding if needed.

It’s important to understand that these platforms, such as Roblox, are social environments that can shape a child’s mood, sleep, sense of safety, and self-worth. As the NSPCC has highlighted, many parents underestimate what actually happens in these online spaces, while children often struggle to talk about what they see and experience. Our job, as clinicians and caregivers, is to stay curious, ask specific questions about gaming, and notice changes in behaviour, sleep, appetite, or school engagement. When we pair open conversations with early mental health support, we provide children a reliable, attuned adult who is watching out for them.

The UBC Department of Family Practice is saddened by the passing of Dr. Marko Yurkovich, a beloved clinical instructor, and alumnus of our Postgraduate Residency Program, on October 4th, 2025.

Dr. Yurkovich pursued his medical training at the University of British Columbia. He completed the Family Practice Postgraduate Residency Program at the Vancouver-Fraser Site from 2014 to 2016, where he returned as a clinical instructor in 2018.

Dr. Yurkovich founded Genetica Medical & Wellness Centre, where he welcomed and mentored countless UBC medical students and residents. As a true leader in primary care, he was instrumental in advancing initiatives that deepened continuity of care and strengthened team-based practice across the community. He was a beloved teacher, mentor, colleague, and friend, whose unwavering passion for patient-centred care shone through every interaction. His team continues to honour his legacy through their dedication to teaching, compassion, and service to the Downtown West End community he so passionately served.

“We, at the Vancouver Fraser Family Practice Site, remember and honour our former resident and colleague, Marko, following his courageous battle with cancer,” says Raquel Feswick, Site Coordinator, on behalf of the Vancouver-Fraser Site. “His commitment to teaching and his advocacy in the community made a meaningful impact. Marko was a valued member of our community and we will miss him dearly. Our thoughts are with his family and loved ones.”

The Marko Yurkovich Colorectal Cancer Foundation was established to commemorate Dr. Yurkovich’s mission to raise awareness, drive research, and advocate for early onset colorectal cancer. He will be missed.

If you would like to leave a message for Marko’s family, or reminisce a memory you shared together, you can do so here.

The BC Simulation Network team is pleased to announce that their revisions to the BC Clinical Event Debriefing Guide.

Some new additions:

• Tailoring the guide to support the facilitator before, during, and after the debrief (this includes sample phrases that can be used in the moment).
• A QR code that links users to references and relevant literature, contact information, and supportive resources such as additional phrases to assist in complex debriefing scenarios.
• Coming soon: video examples of clinical event debriefings, highlighting best practices and opportunities for improvement to support new facilitators, as well as a workshop template and lesson plan to support training.

We are hoping that users can go to the link for the download, as with future revisions this will assure they have the most up to date content.

First, thank you to all that joined us at UBC’s Centre for Health Education Scholarship (CHES) Celebration of Scholarship!

Dr. Meera Anand and I led a roundtable discussion titled “DocBot 101: Making Sense of AI Before It Makes Sense of You.” Our goal was to explore how we can prepare learners to critically engage with artificial intelligence before it begins defining those terms for us.

Below is a brief summary of what we gathered from our dialogue.

We began by asking participants to choose one word that captured their perceptions and experiences with AI in health professions education. Their words painted a landscape of complexity and contradiction:

ever-present, challenging, uncertainty, opportunity, confabulation, hesitating, efficiency, slop :).

These reflect the promise, expectations, and discomfort of a technology reshaping how we teach, learn, and make decisions in both clinical and academic spaces.

What We Heard from Educators: Participants described learners using AI for summarizing literature, interpreting research, drafting emails, grammar correction, and assessment shortcuts. Some found AI slowed them down due to editing demands. Concerns emerged around students growing reliance on its use for creativity and ideation, yet most agreed AI is now embedded, unavoidable, and must be taught.

Preparing Faculty for the AI Era: Faculty are testing AI in their teaching, particularly for case development, and observing its implementation in hospitals, including Vancouver Coastal Health: VCH AI Hub.

When asked how to prepare faculty for AI’s growing presence, key ideas surfaced:

+ Create formal spaces for dialogue and training.
+ Develop institutional policies to guide staff and learners.
+ Use AI to teach ground-truthing, identify confabulations, and strengthen digital literacy.
+ Integrate AI into professionalism guides to clarify boundaries and etiquette.
+ Teach how AI scribes and transcription tools err.
+ Include prompt engineering and assignment design that mitigates over-reliance and academic dishonesty.

The takeaway: educators and administrators share a responsibility to equip learners with the frameworks, skepticism, and confidence to engage with AI responsibly and reflexively.

Learn more about the CHES Celebration of Scholarship here.