Age 38
Mohit Singh can still recall the first day of his psychiatric residency because it shaped the philosophy of his career. His mentor, Dr. Bill MacEwan, took him out in east Vancouver. Together, they saw patients on the street, took them to pharmacies, walked them to detox and connected them with community agencies. “You’re not just sitting in your office and waiting for patients to come to you,” Singh explains. “You’re getting out into the community and meeting them where they’re at.”
Singh was inspired to enter his career watching his mother excel in her own. Defying a typical role for a woman in India, she pursued higher education and became a clinical psychologist before moving to Canada. “I grew up there and saw some of the hardship and struggles that people face. Even as a kid, it sticks out to you and you just can’t help but think that you want to do something to help others.”
Only in his first five years of practice, he’s already advanced to the chief position and fills several roles in various places within AHS. One day he may connect with patients at the Royal Alexandra Hospital, or another he may work with someone who’s facing challenges stemming from substance use. “I’ve been lucky. I feel like
I’m one of the few health-care workers that gets to see people early on in their journey and totally bond through that recovery.”
One of his proudest achievements is starting a Fellowship in Addiction Medicine at the University of Alberta, alongside Dr. Krishna Balachandra and Dr. Kathryn Dong. Singh believes it’ll help shift the culture, train more physicians and provide more support for community clinics and hospitals
The culture shift gives him faith that the province can bend the curve of the opioid crisis. “As human beings, we have the power to work through a lot of different hardships and obstacles,” Singh says, “and with the support that we get from people around us, we can really break through.”
This article appears in the November 2021 issue of Edify
