Foreign-trained doctor on P.E.I. gets boost of confidence from people who knew her skill when they saw it

When Ed Pineau would visit his 97-year-old father at his community care home in Charlottetown, he couldn't help but notice how well the facility's director of care interacted with the residents.

Pineau, a retired doctor who practised on P.E.I. for almost 40 years, also noticed her knowledge of medicine.

It all made sense once he got to know her.

Her name is Kristel Cavazos, she's 33 years old and has been looking after the 50 patients at Geneva Villa for about five years. She studied medicine in Mexico for seven years, graduating in 2014, and worked as a general practitioner there before moving to P.E.I. in 2019 with her husband and child.

"After all the years I worked, you can usually tell if people are good with patients, are empathetic and knowledgeable," Pineau said. "And I was quite impressed by just her general manner."

He then discovered Cavazos wants to become a doctor on P.E.I., but that the process to become licensed and the cost of the exams were barriers for her.

So together with Diane McQuaid, the administrator at Geneva Villa, they loaned her the money for the exams and are helping her any way they can. 

Cavazos said it's given her the motivation to continue chasing her goals.

"I wasn't feeling very comfortable with myself, like I always thought maybe I'm lacking knowledge, I'm lacking the level of English or whatever," she said.

"And then I feel like once I heard back from my boss and from Dr. Pineau, they gave me a lot of confidence. And I think at the beginning they were believing more in me than myself. So it's really nice to have that kind of being backed up."

Cavazos passed both exams. She applied for a residency on P.E.I. through Dalhousie University, but was not chosen. She also applied for associate physician jobs at Health P.E.I., but has not heard back.

She understands the need for standards and licensing for international doctors who move Canada, but sometimes finds it frustrating when she has the knowledge to treat patients herself.

"There's stuff like, I don't know, urinary infections, for example, that's something that happens very often and it's just as easy as checking a lab result and then prescribing," she said. "And especially if you already know them because you end up making relationships and knowing their history."

McQuaid remembers one incident when a resident had fallen and got a small skin tear.