A Nanaimo doctor was presented with a Royal Life Saving Society award by the Queen herself.
Dr. Steve Beerman, the 2020 recipient of the King Edward VII Cup recognizing outstanding contribution to life-saving, was honoured with a virtual awards ceremony earlier this week.
Queen Elizabeth II asked Beerman a little bit about drowning prevention and he told her that there are an estimated 235,000 drowning deaths worldwide each year.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a very compelling and challenging issue, but it does have significant, inexpensive 鈥� interventions which we are trying to share as widely as possible,鈥� he said.
The Queen said it was 鈥渧ery nice to hear about鈥� the 鈥渧ery important鈥� work.
Clive Holland, deputy commonwealth president of the RLSS, said Beerman was being honoured for 鈥渙utstanding national and international leadership in the drowning prevention field for more than four decades.鈥�
Beerman, a former lifeguard, said life-saving is one of his passions. His work includes serving as principal investigator of the Bangladesh Anchal and SwimSafe child drowning prevention research study. He has also served as an advisor to the World Health Organization鈥檚 global report on drowning and for the United Nations. He said a UN resolution on drowning prevention, providing guidance to 194 countries, is 鈥渙ne of the many sentinel events that I鈥檝e been working towards for a long time.鈥�
Beerman retired from Anchor Family Medicine centre in March and was also recently awarded the Dr. David M. Bachop Gold Medal for Distinguished Medical Service from Doctors of B.C., for his contributions to organized medicine and community service.
Beerman helped to establish the UBC family practice residency program in Nanaimo, which serves as an apprenticeship for new doctors. A family doctor in Nanaimo for 34 years, Beerman said he helped set up the residency program 鈥渇rom scratch鈥� in 2007. The Nanaimo site was established as the community was struggling to recruit and maintain family physicians. The program helps to place 16 resident doctors in Nanaimo for two years, with eight graduating each year.
鈥淭hese are people who have finished medical school and they鈥檙e doing two years of family practice training in Nanaimo, and then they get licensed to be family physicians 鈥� there鈥檚 exams they have to write during that period of time and they have experiential learning opportunities, nearly exclusively based in Nanaimo,鈥� said Beerman. 鈥淭hey work both in the hospital and the community setting and about 50 per cent of them end up staying here.鈥�
Congrats to for being awarded the Dr David M. Bachop Gold Medical for Distinguished Medical Service from ! Dr Beerman was the driving force behind the creation of the Family Practice Residency Program in Nanaimo.
鈥� BC Family Doctors (@BCFamilyDoctors)
There is a lack of family doctors in Nanaimo despite the residency program, and Beerman said the issue is complex. There isn鈥檛 actually a lack of family doctors, but a lack of family doctors 鈥渄oing full-spectrum, community-based, family medicine,鈥� he said.
Better collaboration between government funding mechanisms and community need is what is required to remedy the situation, he suggested.
READ ALSO:
reporter@nanaimobulletin.com
Like us on and follow us on
