McGill’s first Inuk medical student from Nunavik looks to ‘decolonize the health system’
Madeline Yaaka, from Kangiqsujuaq, was accepted into program last fall
Madeline Yaaka, who is studying medicine at McGill University in Montreal, walks the hallways of the McGill Library, looking at the art presented on its walls. (Photo by Cedric Gallant, Special to Nunatsiaq News)
Updated on Wednesday, Jan. 3, 2024 at 3 p.m.
Madeline Yaaka says pursuing her education has been a journey.
Hailing from Kangiqsujuaq, Yaaka is the first student from Nunavik to study in McGill University’s medicine program.
The Montreal university reported the milestone in a September article on the faculty of medicine and health sciences’ website.
“If all goes well, in 2027 she’ll become [Nunavik’s] first Inuk physician,” the article said.
Yaaka went to high school in Kangiqsujuaq but quickly found it would be challenging to move on to post-secondary studies from there.
“At the time, they were not giving full diplomas,” she said on Dec. 1 in an interview in a small café near the McGill campus, one of Yaaka’s favourite places to study.
“To enter CEGEP [post-secondary education], I would have to retake my secondary four and five math and sciences course.”
Yaaka said she discussed the situation with her mother, and the two agreed it would be better for Yaaka to move in with her aunt in Ontario, where she could get her required credits in grades 11 and 12.
After completing her high school diploma, Yaaka applied to the biology program at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., and studied there for a year.
“But I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would,” she said, adding the main issue was the amount of time it took to travel between southern Ontario and Kangiqsujuaq.
“It was exhausting,” she said.
“Sometimes I would get stuck for days and days. When you have such little time, with exams and assignments to complete, it becomes a big stressor.”
McGill University medical student Madeline Yaaka stands in the busy hallways of the Montreal school’s library. (Photo by Cedric Gallant, Special to Nunatsiaq News)
Montreal has more direct routes home, so Yaaka packed and moved.
She completed her biology degree at McGill in spring 2023 and immediately jumped into medicine. The medicine program itself is four years long. Afterward, Yaaka will do a residency, which will help her decide what speciality to get into.
“It could be two years or an extra 10 years after the degree,” she said.
Yaaka is open about describing what it’s like being a student from a remote northern community listening to students and educators discuss the health issues there. The experience can be challenging, she said.
For example, a big topic in her curriculum is tuberculosis, a bacterial infection that affects Inuit at a much higher rate than it does the rest of Canada. Nunavik’s health board declared TB outbreaks in five Nunavik communities last year.
In one class, students were shown X-ray images of people from Nunavik as learning material.
“I could read on the bottom right that this X-ray was done in Kuujjuaq in whatever year it was, and I’d be like, ‘Oh, do I know this person?’” said Yaaka.
“This could easily be me put up on the screen for my classmates to see.”
Yaaka said she also finds professors will try to talk about Inuit specifically, when there is a vast population of Indigenous people across Quebec.
“It feels strange that there is this theme of talking about Inuit in a lot of my classes,” she said. “I get quite uncomfortable.”
Yaaka said sometimes it feels so uncomfortable that she avoids going to those classes and watches a recording at home instead.
She knows the teachers do not have ill-intent but feels there is a right way and wrong way to discuss sensitive topics, “especially when there can be somebody from the community within the crowd.”
Yaaka described some ideas to develop a better connection between McGill University and the realities of Nunavik. She said she’d like to see Inuit speaking directly to classes on health issues.
“I believe it’s possible,” she said.
Yaaka said it’s the health-care system in Nunavik, and its issues, that fuels her to complete her degree, however challenging it may be. She recalled seeing a doctor when she was 15 and because the doctor did not speak English, it was impossible for the two to communicate with each other.
“It is so unfortunate that we [in Nunavik] get people that are not bilingual,” she said.
“I feel like institutions don’t prepare doctors to go up North … giving them the tools to deal with isolation and personal relationships within communities.”
Yaaka is also advocating for more people from Nunavik to become doctors too. She said the process may be uncomfortable, and there are many situations in which she is the only Inuk in the room, but she and other Inuit have the right to be there.
“Being the only [Inuk to study medicine at McGill] ever, I think, is quite sad,” she said.
“I truly believe that people in Nunavik need to take care of their own. I think we should decolonize the health system.”
Correction: This article has been updated from its originally published version to correct the fact that Madeline Yaaka is McGill University’s first Inuk student from Nunavik.
“I think we should decolonize the health system.”
What does that even mean? The idea of “decolonization” has become so nebulous and intangible that it’s just a useless signal word now.
Comical how the article concludes with this dangling phrase, no meaning need be explored. Why, because classic Nunatsiaq trollery.
But seriously did you read the article, or did your ego go on the defence filled with fear that you may no longer be relevant??
It means white people need to HIRE AND PAY people who actually know what they’re talking about.
Talk about being tired.
I’m not sure why you jumped right to such a defensive attitude. I think my question must have hit a soft spot.
“It means white people need to HIRE AND PAY people who actually know what they’re talking about.”
I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what we’ve been in trouble for. I thought the now modus operandi was to disregard talent and hire based on immutable physical and intellectual characteristics.
A smart person who was accepted to McGill University’s medicine program should focus more on learning and working hard and competing with the best to become a good physician who can save lives and not get distracted about the new hashtag words that have no significance in the real life and can only be used to justify personal failures.
Well said. No fluff . No handouts.
No one has any idea what it means.
There was an article on CBC a few months ago about a cook in PEI who wanted to ‘decolonize the menu’. She was an Indian immigrant, so maybe she meant she wanted to add variety, but really, from the article you couldn’t tell what she meant.
Im probably not the only one that think it means “make it less white”.
Typical, a white person not understanding brown oppression. Just because you don’t have the knowledge or experience doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.
Yes, decolonize Kanada
It’s too bad that the education system in the north does not prepare students for this kind of post secondary education. Not everyone has an aunt or other person they can live with in the south to get the proper education.
I sincerely wish this student all the best and will root for her, and hope she’s able to brush off the inevitable haters.
The education system is there. It is do watered down and attendance is do terrible that most that make it need college prep courses to make to college level.
“they were not giving full diplomas”
The education system wasn’t there.
pretty sure colleges and universities have dorms for students to stay in, and yea im sure people would rather stay with family but people need to be able to step outside their comfort zone to be able to advance in life
can you please explain to me how you’re going to decolonize the health system? does that mean going back to non colonized forms of medicine? so people wont be taking tylenol for a headache or they wont get medivaced for life threatening injuries?
How would this pan out ? To decolonize the health care? Wow, talk about medical school student , at McGill. Is it possible that she should study with the traditional medicine people, not sure how that works. But I can’t seem to get my head around what decolonization of the medical healthcare would really be like. And in closing, I’m saying she’s confused.
“I truly believe that people in Nunavik need to take care of their own. I think we should decolonize the health system.”
You go girl!
Any doctor in Canada is allowed to establish their own medical school.
You go girl, establish your own, decolonize medical school in Kuujjuaq – or wherever you choose.
I want all the best for this student, but she’ll have problems with trying to decolonize the healthcare. The best she can do is to embrace culture in her field of work, and treat clients with respect to that. But , to decolonize healthcare, is not in her power, or her best interest of herself and Inuit to even try. She needs to explain herself more with an argument that many healthcare workers would show her how Inuit have benefited from colonialism and the health care being received is proof. If Inuit were left out of it all, I don’t think it would have increase life expectancy and population with future.
I think they meant a place in the South to stay in while attending a more comprehensive high school so as to have a better chance at getting into post secondary.
She needed academic grade 11 and 12 and lived with family in southern Canada for that part of high school. I’m sure you missed that part of the article.