A mainstay of the Crowsnest Pass health-care community, Dr. Allan Garbutt is retiring at the end of October, bringing to a conclusion a career of advocating for and supporting rural health care.
Dr. Allan Garbutt has been a long-time rural health advocate and rural physician serving the Crowsnest Pass. He served as president of the Alberta Medical Association (AMA) from 2013-2014 and has been extensively involved with the AMA’s Section of Rural Medicine, including as president, past president, and, then, president again.
Part of Dr. Garbutt’s involvement with the AMA included eight years as a member of the RhPAP (formerly RPAP) Board of Directors, as well as three years as Vice Chair. In addition to this, he has been a Representative Forum delegate since 1997 and has served on numerous committees. For Dr. Garbutt’s many contributions to the association and to the profession, he was recognized with the AMA’s Long-Service Award (2010) and the AMA Member Emeritus Award (2011).
Originally trained as a wildlife biologist (he received a PhD from the University of Guelph), Dr. Garbutt obtained his MD from the University of Western Ontario and completing a rural family medicine residency at the University of British Columbia. He then established a family medicine practice in Crowsnest Pass in 1993 and has remained there since. He has also been a clinical lecturer in the Department of Family Medicine at both the University of Alberta and the University of Calgary.
Throughout his career, Dr. Garbutt has supported the rural physician pipeline to rural practice through his support of the RhPAP–sponsored rural shadowing/mentoring program which offers medical students exposure to rural medicine. His pipeline support came full circle this summer, when he championed a six-week summer health-care career shadowing experience for a Livingstone Range School District high school student, who just happens to attend high school in Lundbreck, the hamlet near his ranch!
We’d like to wish Dr. Garbutt a joyful, relaxing, and fulfilling retirement!