Apotex Inc. Award in Pharmaceutical Sciences
Carissa S.Y. Chan
Third-Year Pharmacy Student
University of British Columbia Vancouver
She personally made more than 700 phone calls to reach half the community pharmacies in British Columbia, in an effort to determine how accessible Mifegymiso is in the province’s community pharmacies.
Carissa S.Y. Chan is currently in her third year of the University of British Columbia’s Entry-to-Practice PharmD program. She was always intrigued by a career in health care. Several of her family members are health-care providers, and she got involved with St. John Ambulance as a youth, where she now volunteers as the divisional administrative officer, while mentoring youth and teaching first aid. Previously, she was a cadet first aid instructor and later on, a civilian officer running the first aid curriculum for a Royal Canadian Air Cadet squadron in Richmond.
“I’ve been involved with St. John Ambulance for 10 years now, and with exposure to life-saving skills on top of my passion for pursuing a career in health care, I decided to choose pharmacy. The decision appealed to me because I love the idea of developing long-term rapport and building a relationship with my future patients, grounded in collaboration, trust, and understanding,” Chan said.
Carissa S.Y. Chan is currently in her third year of the University of British Columbia’s Entry-to-Practice PharmD program.
But her growing passion is research.
She first got to try her hand at research through volunteering at G.F. Strong and then later, at a part-time research assistant role at the UBC Digital Emergency Medicine Lab, where she built skills, competency, and confidence for the next steps.
With research funding, she was tasked to investigate the success and barriers of the Hospital-at-Home program around the world and to bring her findings back to the team in anticipation of the program launch at Vancouver Coastal Health in 2024. This program allows patients to receive medical care at home, while being considered in-patient at Vancouver General Hospital.
“Having gone through three years of education in pharmacy, I know that every lecture and every guideline that we’re taught is built on the foundation of research,” Chan said.
More recently, she received funding to assess the accessibility of abortion medications in British Columbia under the guidance of Dr. Laura Schummers. Between herself and another student, they called every community pharmacy in British Columbia to ask if they are able to dispense Mifegymiso and if so, how long it will take.
“A total of 1,511 B.C pharmacies, and we each called about 750 pharmacies,” she said. “We pretended to be patients to see what the dispensing time was for the pharmacy. Because it is an abortion medication, timeliness is crucial.”
After graduation, she hopes to continue her work in research.
“As a profession, I think there has not been a lot of emphasis on research. We always hear about community practice or hospital practice, but not so much about research post-grad.” Chan said.
“Research is the foundation and guiding light for the recommendations we make to our patients. It is the basis of the changes we make in our practice and health policies within our health-care system. Don’t be afraid to dabble in some research. Maybe you’ll end up loving it.”