Medical Student-led Initiatives

Student-led initiatives are a defining part of the medical school community, reflecting the interests, values, and concerns of its students. Programs supporting mental health, charitable causes, sustainability, and climate awareness create meaningful opportunities to get involved and make an impact both within and beyond the Faculty of Medicine. Find an initiative that speaks to you, get involved, and help shape the community you want to be part of.

Ryan Séguin Peer Support
sMILES for Amanda
Sustainability and Climate Change Committee

Ryan Séguin Peer Support

Ryan Séguin Peer Support is a peer support program that complements the mental health services available for medical students at the Faculty of Medicine. Peer supporters aim to build on their relationships with fellow medical students and use their expertise in understanding the unique challenges of medical school.

Objectives of the program:

  1. To improve help-seeking behaviours;

  2. To reduce stigma;

  3. To provide non-judgmental, accessible, and confidential support to students from peers who have undergone training.

What is a Peer Supporter?

Peer Supporters are medical students chosen after a thorough selection process to provide a listening ear, support and refer classmates in need to services within the Faculty of Medicine. This year we have 67 volunteer Peer Supporters take proactive action by checking in on classmates who may need help.

Frequently Asked Questions

  • The Ryan Séguin Peer Support program complements current mental health services available for our medical students. The program stems from the relationships medical students share and their expertise in understanding medical school challenges. Our 60 Side by Side Peer Supporters are medical students that are trained to provide support to peers.

  • The objectives are to improve help-seeking behaviours, reduce stigma and provide non-judgmental, accessible and confidential support to students from peers who have undergone training. Reaching out proactively to our peers and facilitating their pathway to resources remain the cornerstone of the program.

  • All medical students currently enrolled are able to apply to become a Peer Supporter. Recruitment takes place every year between June and September. Medical students with a passion for student wellness and mental health, with or without prior experience, are encouraged to apply!

  • Peer supporters receive 16 hours of mandatory training prior to starting their role, which includes basics of peer support, mental health in medicine, communication and counselling skills, resources available within the university and in the community as well as signs of distress and crises. The training tailors specific needs of our student population by combining information from the literature, other formal and local resources as well as psychiatrist expertise.

  • Students are welcome to contact their peer supporter of choice through their preferred communication method, including Facebook Messenger, telephone, in person, etc. We encourage maintaining the same means of communication that are already being used between peers.

  • Absolutely! Feel free to contact a peer supporter from any year of study.

  • Every encounter with a Peer Supporter is strictly confidential. Encounters are not shared with other Peer Supporters, the Side by Side executive team, the Student Affairs Office or any faculty member. However, if a student displays risk of self-harm, confidentiality may be broken to ensure safety. Peer supporters log basic information of their interactions into a database used exclusively for statistical purposes and to assess the effectiveness of the Side by Side program. Identifying characteristics and details of conversations are never imputed into the database. Access to the database is limited to the Side by Side executive team.

  • Side by Side is an independent student-run program that is not directly affiliated with the Student Affairs Office. This approach was favoured to minimize the several barriers that medical students face in seeking help.

sMILES for Amanda

“sMiles for Amanda” is a run that was initiated by the 2016 MD Class at UOttawa in memory of classmate Amanda Kelsall. Amanda was killed in a car accident during her second year of Medicine at UOttawa. The annual run, which began in May of 2014, gives MD students and faculty an opportunity to raise funds for various causes, in this way, growing seeds of faith, hope and love planted during Amanda’s life. This initiative inspired an annual extension of the run in Amanda’s home town (Horseshoe Valley) in 2016 as well as several other runs internationally. Thousands of dollars have been raised for various causes. These include the Trauma Unit at the Ottawa Hospital, Ebola Fight in West Africa, Medical Aid for Syrian Refugees, ALS Research, Mental Health (UOttawa Brain and Mind Research Institute), Indigenous Communities through True North Aid/Opioid Crisis, Teen Challenge, Nelson House, the Lighthouse (Orillia)

National Initiatives

    • Health and Environment Adaptive Response Task Force (HEART) is a group within the Canadian Federation of Medical Students (CFMS) that was established in 2016 to help coordinate advocacy efforts among Canadian medical students regarding current issues in environmental health and climate change.

    • The Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) and its sister organization, the Canadian Health and Environment Education and Research Foundation (CHEER) are the primary organizations for Canadian physicians to speak on environmental issues. While CAPE is focused on evidence-based advoacy initiatives, CHEER performs research, analyzes policies, and educates the public. CAPE and CHEER believe that “healthy people require a healthy planet”.

    • CAPE Climate Change Toolkit for Health Professionals

    • The International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations (IFMSA)’s Recommendations for Sustainable and Climate-Friendly Meetings.

    • IFMSA Recommendations

    • The Lancet Countdown: tracking progress on health and climate change is an international, multidisciplinary research collaboration between academic institutions and practitioners across the world. It follows on from the work of the 2015 Lancet Commission, which concluded that the response to climate change could be “the greatest global health opportunity of the 21st century”.

    • 2019 Report

Sustainability and Climate Change Committee

The Sustainability and Climate Change (SACC) Committee was founded in the Fall of 2019 and became an Aesculapian Society Committee in March 2020. The Committee’s goal is to inspire a shift within the uOttawa Faculty of Medicine’s culture towards more sustainable and waste-reduction practices and increase planetary health and climate justice awareness through our 4 program pillars: (1) Aesculapian Society initiatives, (2) Faculty of Medicine initiatives, (3) Student body initiatives, and (4) Curriculum development.

Local Initiatives

    • Sustainable Facility Project 2020-2021

    • COVID Waste Reduction at RGN - PPE Recycling with Terracycle

    • RGN Feedback Form

    • Planetary Health Interest Group

    • Green Book

    • Weekly Resources

    • SIM Website Development

    • Lecture Slides for Climate Change Initiative