New family doctor coming to Belleville in 2019

By Olivia Timm

BELLEVILLE –  A new family physician is coming to the Quinte area next year, the mayor announced at Monday’s council meeting. 

Dr. Brittany Dyer, who is currently in her final year of residency through Queen’s University, will be starting her own family medicine practice in 2019, according to Belleville Mayor Taso Christopher.

Dyer, 26, has spent the majority of her two-year residency in Belleville with the Queen’s Family Health Team. The Queen’s program allows residents to choose between doing their residency in Kingston, Belleville, Peterborough or Oshawa.

“I chose Belleville because I wanted to be somewhat close to home but also in a smaller community as opposed to somewhere like Kingston that is bigger,” she told QNet News in a phone interview.

Home for Dyer is Gananoque, Ont. which is about an hour east of Belleville. Both her and her husband’s family live in the area, and she said the couple is expecting a baby, which made her decision to practice in Belleville easier. Dyer said she won’t be finishing up her residency until July 2019 since she will be on maternity leave. She will start her family practice shortly after.

“I will be practicing in Belleville full-time and will be part of team at the Belleville Hospital, so I will do weeks at a time covering the in-patients there and then I will spend part of my time in the office where I will have my own roster of patients,” Dyer explained. “I like teaching so I would like to be able to take residents on and teach them as well as manage a practice.”

Dyer’s preference is to join the Queen’s Family Health Team, a medical clinic in Belleville, but she said it depends on if there is space when she finishes residency.

She said she has wanted to work in health care since she was in elementary school. 

“I knew I wanted to do something in the sciences field. When I was in elementary school I liked science – biology more specifically. I liked anatomy and physiology. Then I did work at the hospital when I was in high school. I talked to nurses, doctors and pharmacists and decided I wanted to apply to medicine,” she said.

Dyer completed her undergraduate degree at Queen’s University and went to medical school in Ottawa, where she focused on becoming a physician.

“I like it because it is very intellectually stimulating. There is something new everyday and every patient is different. It keeps you on your toes all the time and you get to form really close relationships with patients – especially in family medicine. People trust you as a physician. You get to know your patients very well and they confide things in you that they may not even share with their family or friends.”

Dyer’s residence was funded by the city’s Family Physician Recruitment Program which began in 2007.

The program recruited approximately 24 family physicians – Dyer being the newest – which the mayor called “monumental.”

The program pays $150,000 over six years to medical students or recent graduates who have not yet begun their practice. In exchange, the resident practices family medicine in Belleville for at least five years.

However, most family physicians could end up practicing for longer, Dyer said.

“Especially in family medicine, once you are here for five years and you’ve established a practice and have your own patients, I imagine a lot of people stay for life. I am most likely going to spend the rest of my career here.”