Physiotherapy students who begin their training at UBC will have the chance to finish off their two-year programs in Prince George.
A joint UBC-UNBC program announced Friday will allow up to 20 physiotherapy students to complete the majority of their clinical placements in northern B.C. and rural clinics following completion of their first-year studies, beginning with the 2012-13 school year.
The program at UNBC is open to all 80 students who enter the UBC physiotherapy program each year, and all will have the option of applying for placements to serve their five-week clinical rotations in the spring at northern B.C. locations.
UNBC was also granted provincial government funding to build a new physiotherapy lab that will be linked through a video feed to three other similar labs located at UBC.
"We'd like to thank our partners who made this possible," said UNBC president George Iwama. "We also want to thank especially our MLAs for strongly supporting UNBC's shared desire to increase healthcare professionals in the North."
Friday's announcement came as encouraging news to Dr. Gavin Stuart, dean of medicine and vice provost health at UBC.
"This announcement is another major step towards advancing our vision for distribution of health professional education to better meet the needs of northern and rural British Columbians and builds on the successful expansion of the distributed medical education program at UNBC," said Stuart, in a prepared release.
"Health professional graduates are influenced in their choice of future employment by positive clinical experiences during their training, and we are confident that with our northern and rural clinical educator partners we will establish an excellent northern and rural clinical training program for physical therapy students."
UNBC is already the educational base for training doctors through the Northern Medical Program and Shirley Bond, MLA for Prince George-Valemount, says adding a physiotherapy component is another example of UNBC expanding opportunities for aspiring health care professionals.
"It is critical that we continue to add health care training opportunities in northern British Columbia," Bond said. "The addition of physical therapy will continue the expansion of post-secondary training programs and allow students from the north to stay closer to home as they pursue their chosen careers."
