By Kerry Blackadar
Contrary to widespread belief, a career in medicine is often much more of an art than a science –this is an assessment that few can attest to with more confidence than UBC alumnus, Dr. Anson Koo.
Dr. Koo earned his MD from UBC in 1998, and now, just over a decade later, is Head of Royal Columbian Hospital’s (RCH) Department of Psychiatry. From his fourth-floor office located in the heart of New Westminster, Dr. Koo helps to shape the future of Mental Health care in British Columbia, providing administrative leadership to the Royal Columbian’s inpatient, outpatient, and community Psychiatry and Mental Health Programs.
But unlike many of his colleagues, Dr. Koo’s path to medicine was not through the Sciences, but rather, the Arts.
“Biology, biochemistry, physiology, pharmacology – these are the majors that most of my classmates in medical school pursued,” says Dr. Koo. “Ironically, if I had majored in a pure science, I don’t think I would have ended up here. The pure sciences just didn’t interest me.”
Instead, Dr. Koo majored in Political Science, graduating from UBC with a Bachelor of Arts in 1994.
And, though hard work and perseverance have certainly played a role in determining the course of Dr. Koo’s career, he credits a “very enriching educational journey” as the foundation for its growth.
“The most important thing about an Arts degree is that it nurtures curiosity and forces you to be a student of the world,” he says in hindsight.
In fact, having a broad outlook, which Dr. Koo refers to as “The Arts Mindset,” has proved critical for his current role as a health care administrator.
“What may seem like isolated problems at first are actually impacted by everything happening in the broader world – economic forces, political forces, and socio-demographic forces,” he says.
Restructuring regional psychiatry programs, for instance, ultimately requires Dr. Koo to be mindful of how shifting political power structures may lead to changes in program funding, and how socio-demographic changes – such as the explosion of Surrey’s population – will translate into greater regional health care needs.
Aside from acquiring a worldly attitude, Dr. Koo credits his Arts degree with helping to cultivate good communication and inter-personal skills – both foundational for a career in Medicine and Psychiatry.
“So much of what accounts for people’s feelings of getting better, or being taken care of comes from the quality of the interaction that patients have with their physician,” says Dr. Koo. “We are not really engaged in a scientific enterprise; we’re engaged in a human enterprise.”
Even during the intensive years of medical school training, Dr. Koo maintains that his Arts degree was never a hindrance, and holds “no regrets” about studying political structures instead of learning how to titrate during his undergrad.
“I went into the Arts because I liked the diversity that was available to me,” says Dr. Koo, who selected electives in everything from English and drama to organic chemistry.
Early in his undergraduate career, Dr. Koo began exploring his professional options in more depth.
“I had many interests, and I think I could have been happy pursuing any number of them, but medicine appealed to me for a number of complex reasons,” he says.
Ultimately, it was the potential to make a meaningful difference in peoples’ lives and a broader impact on society that led Dr. Koo to a career in medicine.
Today, in addition to his role as Department Head of Psychiatry at RCH, Dr. Koo also serves as the Division Leader for Fraser Health Adult Mental Health Programs and Academics – a position that requires providing administrative oversight at the regional level by leading the integration and management of regional Mental Health programs, and expanding and developing Fraser Health’s medical student training capacity and residency programs. Dr. Koo also continues to serve as a staff psychiatrist at RCH as well as Clinical Assistant Professor with the University of British Columbia’s Faculty of Medicine.
In the future, Dr. Koo says he hopes to see more Arts undergraduates pursue a career in medicine.
“I think Arts grads could offer a perspective that is extremely unique and valuable in our field,” says Dr. Koo, noting that several of his medical school classmates with Arts backgrounds have gone on to serve as emergency doctors, family physicians, and surgeons across the country.
Overall, however, Dr. Koo says it’s important for Arts graduates to choose a field that truly inspires them.
“I think some students in the Faculty of Arts feel discouraged, thinking that they have closed themselves off – but, they haven’t,” says Dr. Koo with confidence. “They need to realize that there are many, many avenues open to them – avenues that they could never even imagine.”
