Apr 1, 2020

#SCBIpodcast: Supporting residents and seeing patients in the COVID-19 era with Dr. Allyson Merbaum

About DFCM, Residency, Faculty

Small Changes, Big Impact Podcast: Dr. Allyson Merbaum

Transcript and Recording

In studio today, we have Allyson Merbaum, community family physician at North York General Hospital, post-grad site director and assistant professor at the University of Toronto Department of Family and Community Medicine. Today's episode focuses on addressing challenges in community family medicine, and supporting our residents.

Transcript:

Dr. Rezmovitz: (00:35)
How are you?

Dr. Merbaum: (00:37)
I'm doing okay, thanks.

Dr. Rezmovitz: (00:39)
Thank you so much for agreeing to be on the show today. Tell me about your experience so far. What's been going on in your life and how has COVID impacted it?

Dr. Merbaum: (00:53)
Well, certainly the past few weeks have been very, very challenging - both personally and professionally, I would say. I think I had no idea how much would change in such a short time, and trying to balance looking after my patients in this climate, and looking after our 32 residents and the impact that this is having on them has definitely been challenging.

Dr. Rezmovitz: (01:22)
That's a lot of children to look after.

Dr. Merbaum: (01:24)
That's what I say. I call them my 32 other children.

Dr. Rezmovitz: (01:27)
Yeah. Holy smokes. So what's come out of that? Has there been any frustrations or changes to their education? I can't imagine anything has changed whatsoever in their education.

Dr. Merbaum: (01:41)
Yeah, I mean I think there's a lot of uncertainty within their programs, within their curriculum. And I guess I've been trying to keep the communication going and try to provide some sense of normalcy and continuity despite the changing circumstances. So that means continual communication with them both on a group basis and very often on an individual basis and as well with our faculty to make sure we're all kind of on the same page. And I think it's - normally I rave about our preceptor based program where residents are assigned in community practices and each practice works a little bit differently and the resident's role in that office might be a little bit different, and yet they all come out with a similar experience. But again, in the current times, that makes this - I think - even more challenging because the way each office is able to incorporate their residents is a little bit different.