Wendy V. Norman MD MHSc CCFP FCFP

William M. Glenn

As Dr Wendy Norman chose her seat at a local charity’s annual general meeting back in 2008, she had no idea she was about to completely “repurpose” her medical career. “I found myself next to a colleague who was training a couple of days a week as a clinician scholar looking at practical ways to improve the effectiveness of Canadian health care,” says Dr Norman. “The work sounded fascinating. And her department had created a mentorship grant—$1000 or so—that would allow me to pull together a practice-based research proposal with her help.”

A clinic where Dr Norman practised had just reorganized her schedule, freeing up 1 day a week. And with both of her boys now in school full-time, “the opportunity really caught me at a most suggestive moment,” she laughs.

That initial proposal garnered a $25 000 grant from the BC Women’s Hospital that helped Dr Norman establish the Contraception Access Research Team (www.cart-grac.ca). A national interdisciplinary collaboration, the Contraception Access Research Team collects the data and conducts the detailed background studies needed to build and support progressive family planning programs and policies across Canada.

Proposal after proposal followed, multiplying that original modest investment more than 150-fold and culminating in 2014 with Dr Norman’s appointment as Chair in Applied Public Health Research to lead her Family Planning Research Program at the University of British Columbia. The Canadian Institutes of Health Research provided an initial 5 years of funding, while the University of British Columbia’s Department of Family Medicine promised support for an additional 5. “It’s given me a research mandate for at least the next 10 years,” she says. The funding protects 75% of Dr Norman’s time for research, with the remainder divided between her medical practice and teaching commitments.

To date, Dr Norman has launched 19 research projects and published 20 papers, with 3 more in the peer-review pipeline. This is all applied research designed to reap immediate and tangible results. For example, Dr Norman’s first research project found that one of Canada’s most pressing contraception issues was the restrictions on the contraceptive choices available to First Nations women; according to bureaucratic policies, they could only get a new intrauterine device of any kind every 5 years, even if the first model required removal for medical or planned pregnancy reasons. “We gathered the data, undertook a review of the evidence, and presented our results to Health Canada,” says Dr Norman. “Within 2 weeks they changed the policy.”

Her team is currently going door-to-door in British Columbia, compiling data to better understand the pregnancy intentions of Canadians. “Unplanned pregnancies impose a tremendous economic burden on both the individual and society,” says Dr Norman. “Our surveillance and advanced modeling program will provide strong evidence to determine if it makes sound economic sense to provide contraception free of charge. This is ground-breaking research.”

Despite her busy schedule, Dr Norman still sees patients and still works regularly in several clinics. “My research work is pragmatic and focused on how medical policies and services work in real life,” says Dr Norman. “The one-to-one doctor-patient relationship lies at the core of what I do and is a huge driver for both my research and my teaching.”

“FP research is my best chance to improve health for our patients”

PHOTOS (LEFT): Dr Norman in her research offices within the Women’s Health Research Institute of BC Women’s Hospital in Vancouver and sharing some of her research findings.

PHOTOS (RIGHT): (From top, down) Dr Norman sharing a quiet moment in the park with her husband, Olaf Lepper. Dr Norman and Olaf meet her youngest son, Marek Blachut, returning from Nepal after volunteering with Habitat for Humanity. Dr Norman relaxing at home. (Above) Olaf shares his passion as a wood turner and teacher, explaining a prized piece of burl wood.

Footnotes

Dr Norman is Chair of the Section of Researchers of the CFPC and holds a CIHR Chair in Family Planning Applied Public Health Research. She leads the Contraception Access Research Team national network through the Women’s Health Research Institute at BC Women’s Hospital in Vancouver.
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.