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Kaylynn Purdy, MD

  • Master's Graduate in Health Policy, 2023

Biography

Kaylynn Purdy (she/her) graduated with an MS in Health Policy in 2023. She is also a current fourth year Adult Neurology resident doctor at the University of Alberta and is taking a brief pause in her residency to study at Stanford. She completed her Honours Bachelor of Health Science degree with First Class Distinction at the University of Calgary and then completed medical school at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine. 

She originally comes from a small town in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, Canada called Sparwood and it is this origin that sparked a passion for improving healthcare for rural and remote communities. Her research interests are in health equity and improving access to health care for rural and remote populations with a special focus on access to neurologic and critical care medicine

In addition, she has a leader in medical education policy in Canada. She is a current board member of the Association of Faculties of Medicine of Canada (AFMC), which represents Canada's 17 faculties of medicine and is the voice of academic medicine in Canada.  She previously served as a board member of the Canadian Federation of Medical Students (CFMS) and the Canadian Residency Matching Service (CaRMS).

Purdy is supported by the University of Alberta Division of Neurology Mildred I. Olsen Neurology Fellowship and the University Hospital Foundation Neurology Fellowship fund.

In The News

Kaylynn Purdy and Brother Blake
Commentary

Health Policy Student: My Brother’s Death Is Not a Statistic

After Kaylynn Purdy lost her older brother to a drug overdose, she chose to write about his death to highlight the human faces behind the opioid epidemic both in Canada and here in the United States.
cover link Health Policy Student: My Brother’s Death Is Not a Statistic