Dr Agnes Kluz MD CCFP

William M. Glenn

I found out I was pregnant on my very first day of residency,” Dr Agnes Kluz laughs. “I was so scared, I almost peed my pants.” She needn’t have worried. Residency turned out to be 2 of the best years of her life, thanks to the tremendous support of her program director, her colleagues, and the whole staff at the Regina General Hospital in Saskatchewan. Her parents even relocated to Saskatchewan to help out while her husband Andrzej finished his residency.

Twenty years ago, the situation might have been different. Today’s program directors are “visionary and creative in helping physicians who choose to start a family while completing their training,” says Dr Kluz. “After all, many residents are at the height of their prime childbearing years. Directors know that if they don’t offer the proper support, they’ll lose some excellent future doctors.”

Dr Kluz and her extended family are now back in Ontario, living in the very small town of Seaforth, about a 30-minute drive from Stratford. She’s 1 of 7 physicians with the Huron Community Family Health Team, practising family medicine as well as geriatric and palliative care a half-day per week at nearby Seaforth Manor. Her husband spends much of his time working in the emergency departments of the local hospitals.

With daughter Sofia—now age 6—joined by baby Henryk last year, it’s still a balancing act being “full-time doctors, full-time parents, and full-time spouses,” Dr Kluz says. Fortunately, their new colleagues and neighbours have been extremely welcoming and supportive. “They embraced us. Somebody will always step in if there’s a problem. Someone will always pick up the slack,” she says. “That’s the beauty of being part of a small community.”

Of course, there are the logistic problems of small-town life. She’s putting a lot of kilometres on the car visiting patients and family, and driving Sofia to school, gymnastics, or Polish dance classes. There are even occasional trips to Toronto for a meal or an evening at the theatre.

“You have to make certain sacrifices when you believe in something,” says Dr Kluz. “But I love driving through the countryside, catching up on my daughter’s day, singing along to the soundtrack from Frozen. We thoroughly enjoy serving our rural community. This is where we are going to stay and raise our family. We are never going to give this up.”

“You can’t compartmentalize being a doctor from being a parent,” says Dr Agnes Kluz. “Whether you are dealing with a sick child or a couple comes to you with a marital problem or you are carting your 6-month-old along on a housecall … I think that being a parent makes you a better doctor.”

“Being a parent makes you a better doctor”

PHOTOS: Dr Kluz with 2 of her favourite patients, Deirdre O’Reilly (95 years old) surfing the net on her tablet, and Edna Storey (100 years old) reading a romance novel (top left). Dr Kluz hanging out with her mother, Zofia Weznerowicz, and her children, Sofia and Henryk, making a mess while trying to make breakfast (bottom left and above), and playing with Sofia (bottom right).

Footnotes

Dr Kluz is a family physician with a special interest in care of the elderly in the rural town of Seaforth, Ont.
THE COVER PROJECT Canadian Family Physician has embarked on a project to assemble the portrait of family medicine in Canada. Each cover of the journal features a family physician chosen at random from our membership list, along with a short essay—a brief glimpse of the person and the practice. Over time, the randomness will become representative and the differences, taken together, will define what it is that all family physicians have in common.