Heart Institute’s ‘Dr. K’ blazes new path as Canada’s first Inuk cardiac surgeon
Physician recognized as a role model for young women and Indigenous youth
There were no doctors in Donna May Kimmaliardjuk’s family. No nurses, not even a physiotherapist. Still, from the time she was very young, Kimmaliardjuk was determined to become a physician.
Now 28, she’s doing a residency in heart surgery.
Kimmaliardjuk — “Dr. K” to patients at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute — is Canada’s first Inuk heart surgeon, recently recognized with an Indspire Award for being a role model for young women and Indigenous youth.
“I feel like I have a responsibility now. I think what I want to do, at the very minimum, is share my story and let them know how it’s possible to complete high school and go on to post-secondary education,” Kimmaliardjuk says.
“A kid can’t do everything on their own. It takes a lot of support and a lot of determination. I’m an example of what can be done.”
Kimmaliardjuk has roots in Chesterfield Inlet, Nunavut, a village of only a few hundred people. Her grandparents were both born in an igloo. One of her great-grandfathers was a shaman.
Born in Winnipeg, Kimmaliardjuk lived briefly in Nunavut before her parents decided to move south, settling in Orléans. She went to St. Peter Catholic High School, where she excelled in math and science, and loved to play the piano.
“I was really nerdy,” she says. “I wanted to be a surgeon because I liked working with my hands.”
Kimmaliardjuk and her brother, Stephen, were the only Indigenous students at St. Peter.
If there was racism, she says, she didn’t feel it deeply.
“I think I was fortunate,” she says.
According to Statistics Canada’s 2011 National Household Survey, about 42 per cent of Inuit between the ages of 18-44 completed the requirements for a school diploma, compared to 89 per cent of the non-Aboriginal population. About 26 per cent of the Inuit population in that age range had post-secondary credentials in 2011, compared to 64 per cent of the non-Aboriginal population.
Kimmaliardjuk went to Queen’s University in the life sciences program — plenty more math and science — and graduated in 2011. She decided to go to medical school at the University of Calgary. When it came time to apply for a residency, she contemplated going into family medicine and working in the North, but her mentor convinced her to apply for a residency in cardiac surgery.
“I felt a bit guilty that I didn’t want to be a family doctor and I couldn’t give back to my community. But my mentor said, ‘You can’t let that dictate what you want to do.’ ”
Her mother, Julia Kimmaliardjuk, believes her daughter’s vocation goes back to a blessing she received from her great-grandmother. Julia was visiting with her infant daughter when the elder asked her to approach and took the baby’s hand.
“These hands will help a lot of people and they will save some lives,” Julia recalls the greatgrandmother saying at the time.
“My daughter was sitting there, completely mesmerized,” says Julia. “I didn’t think too much about it. Now she’s saving lives with those hands.”
Julia says she and Kimmaliardjuk’s father, a commercial pilot, always emphasized the importance of education and structure to their children.
“She came from a small community. This world is huge. When you don’t have the comfort of your community, it’s scary. But you have to make your dream a reality, no matter what the obstacles are.”
Julia was educated at the insistence of her own grandfather, who couldn’t speak English and was once stung by his inability to defend himself when he was accused of theft by an RCMP officer.
She went to residential school in the early 1980s and felt drawn to a military career.
“I used to get these catalogues, Sears or Eaton’s, and see images of people in their uniforms. I was fascinated,” she says.
In 1984, while living in Ottawa, Julia went into a recruiting centre and signed up. She went through basic training and was assigned to work in finance and logistics.
“Basic training was the hardest, but it taught me the best lessons,” she says. “There’s something in me that always enjoyed structure. It was calling me, so I followed that calling.”
In turn, she stressed discipline and structure to her children.
Kimmaliardjuk considers her parents to be her best role models.
“They set examples of working hard and being kind and having high self-esteem,” she says.
Kimmaliardjuk is disarmingly modest, describing her medical residency as “a kind of apprenticeship.”
Residency spots in certain medical specialties are coveted, and a spot in cardiac surgery is notoriously difficult to win. Still, she insists that cardiac surgery was less competitive the year she applied because there have been few job openings for cardiac surgeons.
“What I like about surgery is that you can have an impact on a person’s life right there and then. Sometimes people don’t take their meds. But if you do heart surgery, you do something, right there.”
Jeffrey Taylor had a triple bypass at the Heart Institute in September. He praises Kimmaliardjuk for her bedside manner.
“The last person I saw before they put me under was Dr. K. She was rubbing my hand. She went though the whole operation with me. She even allowed me to return home a little early. I’m a big fan. So is my wife, because I’m home,” he says.
“She’s very bubbly. There’s a mask covering her face, but you can see her eyes. Those eyes just sparkle like diamonds. It’s very relaxing, very calming.”
Yes, it’s about being a good technical surgeon, says Kimmaliardjuk, “but I’m also in this for my patients.
“I take a lot of pride in my relationships with my patients, with being able to empathize with them. I think I get that from my mother. She’s a fantastic communicator.”