Student Bursary
Transforming Indigenous healthcare: Camryn’s story
Aug 24, 2026
Camryn, a third-year Red River Métis student from Winnipeg, is reshaping healthcare. She envisions a future where Western medicine incorporates Indigenous ways of knowing, treating patients in their full complexity—body, spirit and history.
At fifteen, Camryn received a diagnosis that would set her on this path. A chronic neurological disorder made simple tasks like sitting at a desk and holding a pencil feel impossible. Academic struggles followed, threatening the identity of someone who had always thrived in school.
As Camryn slowly learned to manage her condition, something shifted. The frustration of being unheard by doctors became fuel for purpose. She realized the Canadian healthcare system needed to be transformed with more compassion, more listening and more holistic care.
Camryn decided to do something about it by becoming a doctor. As she reflects, "I want to make sure that my patients are heard and cared for, instead of being ignored like I experienced.”
This summer, Camryn will be preparing for the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) while volunteering at a campus café serving students experiencing food insecurity.
Beyond her studies, Camryn works as a research assistant cataloguing traditional Indigenous foods across Canada with a goal of understanding consumption habits between Indigenous groups and across regions. Her team collected data from 96 publicly available resources from every province and territory describing the traditional foods from First Nation, Inuit and Métis communities.
This project revealed an urgent gap: many people don't know which berries, fish and plants are traditional foods. So Camryn is designing cooking workshops for Indigenous students that are affordable, accessible and grounded in cultural knowledge.
"These workshops are a great way to implement our research about traditional foods at the community level," she notes, envisioning a ripple effect of healthier eating habits and cultural reconnection as part of her TELUS Student Bursary social impact project.
