Dr. Allan Garbutt, President of Alberta Medical Association
Herald Contributor photo
Dr. Allan Garbutt, President Elect of the Alberta Medical Assocation.
LISA SYGUTEK
Pass Herald Staff
The Alberta Medical Association (AMA) is the professional association representing the physicians of Alberta. Its mission: “The AMA stands as an advocate for its physician members, providing leadership and support for their role in the provision of quality health care.” The AMA is the provincial division of the Canadian Medical Association.
A Board of Directors that includes representatives from each health region in Alberta governs the AMA.
Founded in the same year as the province, the Alberta Medical Association (AMA) now represents about 95% of Alberta's practicing physicians as well as resident physicians and medical students.
The newest president elect to the AMA is local doctor Allan Garbutt. According to Garbutt, “the medical association phoned me and asked me to take the job”.
Garbutt, a family physician based in Crowsnest Pass, is the Alberta Medical Association's (AMA's) 2012-13 President-Elect.
Garbutt is an active AMA member and is currently serving as President, Section of Rural Medicine; Representative Forum delegate; Member, Primary Care Alliance Board and Forum; Member, Section of General Practice Executive; Member, Primary Care Network Physician Leads Executive; Member, Physician Advocacy Group.
According to the AMA website, “His contributions to the association and the profession have been recognized with the AMA's Long Service Award (2010) and the distinction of AMA Member Emeritus (2011)”.
Dr. Garbutt received his medical degree from the University of Western Ontario and completed a rural family medicine residency at the University of British Columbia in 1993.
That year, he moved to Crowsnest Pass, where he remains today, helping to care for the town’s almost 6,000 residents as well as the many tourists who travel to the area each year.
Dr. Garbutt has been a clinical instructor in the Department of family medicine, Faculty of Medicine, at the University of Calgary since 1994. He is also a long-time member of the Society of Rural Physicians of Canada.
According to Garbutt, “this will complicate my medical time. I have to travel to Edmonton every Friday for meetings. Focus has been to get a contract with government and we did that in the spring”. In his term Garbutt wants to spearhead a “new mandate to make changes to care delivery in the province”.
Garbutt noted that he is excited to embark on this new journey in the medial profession and hopes to help bring changes to the way rural medicine is delivered.
