UWS’ Community-Based Clinical Education program allows students to gain experience wherever they wish to practice.
University of Western States has earned an international reputation and welcomes students from around the world. Over the years, many of those international students have come from Canada. Among the more recent graduates from our neighbors to the north is Mallory MacDonald from the Maritime province of New Brunswick. Like a lot of other Canadian UWS graduates, MacDonald took advantage of UWS’ Community-Based Clinical Education (CBCE), which uses a distributed network to allow students to engage in clinical immersions in many different health systems and geographic regions. MacDonald has returned to her home province to complete her preceptorship and begin her career. “I couldn’t imagine practicing anywhere else,” she says.
Growing up in a small town of 600 people, MacDonald was an avid athlete until a severe knee injury in high school ended her rugby career. “I saw different physiotherapists for years, and I wasn’t getting the results I wanted,” she says. Ultimately, she found she got the best results from chiropractic care. The experience inspired her to pursue chiropractic as a profession.
A Lifetime of Athletics Led to a Career Helping Them Heal
When choosing among chiropractic schools, she considered a program in Toronto but preferred UWS because it offered a more condensed program, which meant that she could complete her training and begin practicing sooner. After a drive across North America, MacDonald arrived in Portland to find herself to be one of a large percentage of her classmates in the Chiropractic program who were Canadian. “I was the only one from the East Coast,” she says, “but it made for a better transition.”
Now, MacDonald is in her 12th and last quarter of the chiropractic program. “I did get very good clinical experience at University of Western States,” she says. “It prepared me well to practice, and I’m excited to start working professionally.”
Serving the Folks Back Home
For her preceptorship, MacDonald is working in a private multidisciplinary health care clinic in Fredericton, New Brunswick’s capital. Her chiropractic training, including her work in the UWS Health Center, gave MacDonald the experience necessary to work independently in her current setting. “I see my own patients. I have my own schedule,” MacDonald says, and each day I have rounds with a different clinician at the clinic where I can ask them anything.”
She hopes to practice in the same clinic in which she is currently working, as her educational journey comes full circle and likes the idea of giving back, especially among the athlete population. “When I was growing up it was hard to find the proper health care that I needed,” she says.
“We have students placed across Canada, including many in British Columbia and Alberta,” says Patrick Battaglia, DC, associate vice president of CBCE. “These placements highlight the CBCE program’s flexibility and commitment to serving students where they are.”
MacDonald agrees. The quality of the classroom instruction combined with hands-on experience in the school clinic, the presence of so many fellow Canadians in her cohort, and the opportunity to begin practicing in her home province straight out of chiropractic school all contributed to her positive educational experience. “The University of Western States did a really good job and was very welcoming to Canadian students,” she says.