A major expansion is in the works for Atlantic Canada’s supply of trained technicians to support the region’s growing use of genomic applications in clinical medicine.
“This need is real,” said Dr. Simon Potter, director of the New Brunswick Community College Office of Research Enterprise.
While it’s early days, he is optimistic the new program, a first for the region, could be ready to launch as early as spring 2025 at NBCC’s Allied Health Campus in Saint John. It is envisioned that the new curriculum will dovetail with NBCC’s existing medical laboratory technologist program and accommodate 20-40 students a year.
“We are directly responding to what we’ve been told,” he said. Dr. Potter was referring to the results of a needs assessment, backed by Genome Atlantic’s Genome Opportunity Review Program (GORP), that he completed last year with Dr. Kyle Brymer, NBCC’s Research Associate in Health, and Karen Debroni, Principal of Debroni & Associates.
“Pretty much, everybody we spoke to said: ‘Yeah, we have a need here for this. At the moment it’s been met by us sending samples out of the region, or looking for people outside the region. We can’t hire here. And we can’t cost-effectively do things here.’ ” The consultation exercise left Dr. Potter convinced that NBCC’s role could be “critical” in helping build “that ecosystem in the Atlantic region” that will allow genomics to thrive here.