Windsor Training Sites

Windsor, Kingsville, Leamington, Amherstburg, Harrow, Tilbury

 

Dr Helena Hamdan

SITE DIRECTOR BIO

Dr. Helena Hamdan was born in Lebanon, immigrated to Canada when she was eight years old, and lived in Ottawa prior to moving to Windsor during medical school. 

Dr. Hamdan graduated from the University of Ottawa with an Honours Biochemistry undergraduate degree. She started medical school at the University of Ottawa in 2001 and transferred to the Western Windsor-based clerkship program in 2003. Dr. Hamdan was a part of the first group of clerks to train in Windsor as a new satellite medical school, nicknamed “The Windsor 9”. She then completed her family medicine residency at Western, again as one of the first full time residents to train in the Windsor satellite program, graduating in 2007.

Dr. Hamdan has been practicing in Windsor since July 2007 as part of a FIG initially, and then FHO for the past 10 plus years. Her practice is a comprehensive community based medical practice. She became an Adjunct Professor with the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry in 2009 and Associate Academic Coordinator for the Windsor Campus Family Medicine Postgraduate program in 2016.

Dr. Hamdan was the recipient of the Windsor Family Medicine Faculty of the Year Award in 2016-2017 and 2020-2021, and the recipient of the Dr. Ian McWhinney Teacher of the Year Award in 2020-2021. 

Dr. Hamdan is married, with no children. She loves what she does and is dedicated to excellence in teaching of family medicine to new students and residents. In her free time, she loves travelling with her husband, family, and friends to places where she can spend most of her time hiking, swimming and enjoying the outdoors. 

About Windsor and Essex County

Windsor-Essex is a dynamic area that borders Michigan. Windsor is across the river from Detroit. The area has a population of over 350,000 and is known for its friendly, welcoming people and rich multi-ethnic population. Windsor has great restaurants and entertainment and easy access to all of the cultural and sporting activities of Detroit. Metro Detroit airport is just thirty minutes away and offers many international and national flights to your destination of choice.  Essex county is known for its wineries (https://ecwb.ca/wineries/), and Point Pelee National Park, the southern most point of Canada (https://www.pc.gc.ca/en/pn-np/on/pelee).  There are several family medicine teaching sites across the city and county.

TRAINING SITES/PRACTICE DESCRIPTION

Windsor has 10 CARMS positions (7CMG and 3IMG). We aim to give residents their 1st or 2nd choice of family medicine preceptors.  We pride ourselves on a 1:1 ratio of faculty to resident during your core family medicine rotation and low resident to physician ratio across all specialties.  We emphasis teaching and offer flexibility in the curriculum to give the residents the best experience possible as part of their training. We have 80% retention rate over the years of our residents staying in Windsor and Essex County.  We have two PGY3 programs in Windsor, Palliative care and Hospitalist Medicine.  Our curriculum and rotations are consistently highly rated by our residents over the years.  We are especially proud of our Palliative care and Behavioural Medicine rotations which are unique to our site. 

The major teaching site has traditionally been the Family Health Centre at the Windsor Professional Centre building on Howard Avenue. However, over the last 10 years many sites across the city and county have been added, including rural core FM sites in Leamington and Kingsville.  This has given our residents a huge variety of practice types and populations to chose from for their core family medicine rotation, as well as rural family medicine rotation and any family medicine electives they chose to add as part of their curriculum.  All preceptors practice comprehensive and evidence-based medicine with large practices.  Many of the preceptors also have special interest parts to their practice.

Another unique feature of the Windsor-Essex site is our academic half days featuring residents teaching residents, with faculty supervision.  These academic half days aim to cover all 105 topics from the SAMPs portion of the CCFP licencing examination. 

Every 3 months we hold a Town Hall meeting with our current residents where we invite them to bring forth any issues or suggestions, they may have to improve the curriculum and their learning experience. Over the years discussion during these meeting have led to major improvements in the curriculum, resident learning and satisfaction.

In order to prepare residents for their certification exams we hold twice yearly, highly organized practice SOO session with family physician/faculty volunteering as patients and examiners.  As well, the first-year residents organize yearly Mock OSCE sessions for the second-year residents to aid with preparation for the MCCQE II.

FACULTY INTEREST

  • Faculty to resident ratio: 1:1
  • Procedures: Most preceptors perform office procedures including joint injections and aspirations, punch biopsies, excisional biopsies, suturing, and breast cyst aspirations.
  • Opportunity to work with a hospitalist during your core family medicine rotation
  • Medical care of incarcerated people
  • Etc…

TEACHING OPPORTUNITIES

  • Academic half days: residents teaching residents
  • Monthly family practice grand rounds
  • Journal club
  • Mock OSCEs
  • Teaching experience: often clinical clerks are present to allow residents to practice and enhance their teaching skills
  • Teaching clinical exam skills and interview skills in small group settings to medical students

Elective opportunities: Horizontal and Monthly

  • Residents at our site will have a wide variety of elective choices to enhance their learning and tailor it to their specific needs. For example, residents can chose to do extra time in pediatrics, women’s health or a specific sub speciality.
  • During your time in family medicine, you can become involved with horizontal electives, most of which are supervised by family doctors. For example:
    • After-hours walk-in clinics.
    • Chiropractic
    • Counselling services
    • Geriatrics
    • HIV Clinic and Methadone Clinics
    • In-patient care: you will make hospital rounds with your preceptor or with hospitalists who are family doctors.
    • Midwifery
    • Palliative care is offered at Windsor's exceptional and unique Hospice Village.
    • Pharmacy
    • Podiatry
    • Teen Health Centre
    • Women's health
    • Wound care
    • Etc…

RESOURCES ON-SITE

  • Internet access
  • Many of the training sites' practice structures are family health groups, family health organizations, or family health teams, as such there are often nurse practitioners, diabetic educators, pharmacists, physiotherapists on site.
  • The local administrative staff in Windsor work tirelessly to ensure the best possible experience for our residents.

 

TYPICAL WEEK FOR RESIDENT

A typical week will vary depending on the teaching sites. In general, you will be working with your primary preceptor Monday through Friday, with Wednesday afternoons being protected for your academic half days.  Most offices will have occasional late evening and weekend shifts to provide after hours care for their patients.  Windsor offers flexibility in setting up a typical week. Most of the work is office-based with time for hospital rounds, academic half-days, and horizontal electives which are available during each week.

OTHER INFORMATION FOR RESIDENTS

On-Call:

  • Variable but according to PARO rules
  • Opportunities for nightly call, backing up Telephone Health Advisory Services are available
  • Night or weekend hospital call where the resident will be first call for ER admissions for their practice