Born in Zimbabwe and trained in South Africa, Dr. Ray Markham first immigrated to Canada in 1992, where he practiced for three years in rural Newfoundland. In 1995, he began a seven-year career in General Practice with the British Army in the UK completing his General Practice Vocational Training and his Membership in the Royal College of General Practitioners. During that time, Ray was awarded the Sydney Herbert Medal and Prize for achievement in post-graduate medical officer training, and the Queen Mother Prize for GP vocational training.

In 2002, Ray returned to Canada and settled with his family in Valemount, BC to practice rural generalist family medicine. He was named to the Order of British Columbia in 2009 for his service in Valemount.

Ray served as the Medical Director for UBC Rural Continuing Professional Development from 2013-2019 and became Executive Director of the Rural Coordination Centre of BC in Jan 2016. He currently serves as the Health Systems advisor to VPHealth at UBC Health. He participates at several rural medical tables, and regularly leads multidisciplinary volunteer teams from Canada to Zimbabwe through UBC Global Health aiming at bi-directional capacity building.

Patricia’s career has ranged from arctic nursing to clinical genetic research and education. Her skill is to identify gaps in medical genetics clinical education and then to obtain grants to create novel programs to fill these gaps.

Patricia instigated a seminar series to support research excellence in UBC’s MSc Genetic Counselling program; developed the highly successful online Graduate Certificate in Genomic Counselling and Variant Interpretation; and most recently initiated a pilot project to integrate genetics and genomics education into the new Nurse Practitioner’s Master’s program at Thompson Rivers University.

She consistently uses ingenuity and creativity in course design and organization, often forming collaborative teams of experts across faculties and institutions. Her innovative and determined efforts develop tools to strengthen the capacity of genetic counsellors and nurses to use their knowledge to improve health outcomes.

Patricia credits Dr. J.M. Friedman for the unique space, freedom, and support he has provided over her many years as his lab manager.