Annual Report Feature

Dr. Victor Martinez and Dr. Karen Bedard

Genetics takes centre stage in new education programs

Department of Pathology members are leading three major education initiatives designed to increase capacity for human genetics and genomics research and clinical investigation in the Maritimes.

CCMG fellowship program to train clinical lab scientists

As the number and complexity of genetic tests continues to expand globally, the Department of Pathology, NS Health and IWK Health have joined forces to launch a new training program designed to build capacity to meet the growing demand.

“Personalized, precision medicine is the future of medicine, but it requires sophisticated genetic and genomic testing,” says Dr. Karen Bedard, a clinical lab scientist at IWK Health and associate professor in the Department of Pathology who is spearheading the new program. “This means we need more clinical lab scientists with advanced expertise in human genetics and genomics testing and analysis.”

The new two-year subspecialty program will qualify graduates to be certified fellows of the Canadian College of Medical Geneticists (CCMG) upon successful completion of the CCMG national certification exam. MDs and PhDs are eligible to apply.

“Clinical lab scientists with genetics expertise are in short supply and there is a growing demand globally,” says Dr. Heleen Arts, a clinical lab scientist at the IWK and associate professor in the Department of Pathology who played a key role in creating the curriculum for the new CCMG program. “Rather than sending people to an external CCMG program, we decided we must mobilize to offer the accredited training here.”

The program will begin accepting learners early in 2026, and will take up to two new students a year. Graduates will fill an important and growing gap in the health-care system.

“There is an explosion of new technologies and increasingly complex tests in human genetics and genomics, and we will need more qualified people to interpret and report genetic test results to medical geneticists and other specialists,” says Dr. Bedard. “Our CCMG graduates will be experts in genetics, including next-generation genome sequencing and cytogenetics techniques such as genome mapping, microarray and karyotyping.”

Dr. Bedard has been working with Dr. Arts, Dr. Jo-Ann Brock, medical director of Precision Medicine at the IWK, and Dr. Tanya Gillan, a clinical lab scientist at NS Health, for nearly three years to develop the CCMG program.

The addition of this program to Dalhousie’s offerings will help attract and keep qualified professionals in the region. “Karen Bedard had the vision and has been a strong leader in putting this program together,” notes Dr. Arts.

“She has served as chair of the CCMG accreditation committee, so she brought a deep understanding of the requirements to this initiative and was able to support the rest of us to do our parts.”

Dr. Heleen Arts and Dr. Jo-Ann Brock

“Mainstreaming” equips clinicians to provide genetic testing

Increasing the numbers of lab scientists qualified to run genetic tests is one vital part of building capacity for precision medicine. The other essential aspect of this equation is to increase the numbers of clinicians with the necessary expertise to order these tests. That’s why members of the Department of Pathology have teamed up with other colleagues at the IWK and NS Health to launch a new “mainstreaming” initiative, Introduction to Genetic Testing.

“Introduction to Genetic Testing provides specialists outside the field of medical genetics with the knowledge they need to provide pre-test counselling, order the correct genetic tests, and interpret the results for their patients,” says Dr. Brock. “It’s a continuing professional development opportunity that empowers specialists to order genetic testing within their scope of practice.”

The self-paced online course is free to clinicians, who earn 3.5 CME credits upon completion of eight modules and a test. With this credential in hand, physicians in specialties other than medical genetics can order genetic testing panels within their specialty directly, saving patients and their families months or even years of waiting for vital knowledge.

“There is so much more that clinicians need to understand in order to select the most appropriate tests for their patients these days,” Dr. Brock explains. “Not only are more tests available, but each test can now evaluate as many as 50 to 200 genes, or even an entire exome. So we’ve gone from tests for a single gene to tests that represent all known relevant genes for any given disorder. This is a huge increase in complexity.”

While Dr. Brock played a high-level advisory role, lab scientist Dr. Karen Bedard, data scientist Dr. Victor Martinez, and genetic counsellors Jimena Prado, Andrea Rideout and Michelle Lane, developed the course and rolled it out to a pilot cohort of cardiologists in 2025, before making it available to specialists in every field.

Introduction to Genetic Testing is designed to be completed quickly and easily. “Each of the eight modules consists of a 30-minute audio recording and transcripts, so clinicians can do the whole course over a weekend,” says Ms. Prado. “It covers basic as well as advanced material, so everyone gains a common baseline understanding of the terminology and procedures.”

Dr. Dan Gaston

Graduate program to train next generation of genetics researchers

A new graduate program in human genetics and genomics is in the works in the Department of Pathology. The Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Graduate Studies and Dalhousie University’s Senate have approved the program in principle, and are expected to approve the detailed logistics, curriculum, and resourcing in 2026. The final stamp of approval will come from the Maritime Provinces Higher Education Commission.

“We are strong in genetics research at Dalhousie, but since we don’t have a genetics department or a specific graduate program, this has been a hidden strength,” says Dr. Karen Bedard, who is leading the charge to launch this new program. “Once approved, the new graduate program will highlight, enhance and grow our ability to pursue focused research in human genetics.”

The Human Genetics and Genomics graduate program will be housed within the Department of Pathology, due in large part to the increasingly central role of genetics in clinical testing and therapeutic interventions, particularly in the realm of cancer. It will operate alongside the existing more general pathology graduate program, as an option for master’s and PhD students seeking a deep dive into genetics research.

“Students are constantly requesting to do their graduate studies research projects with our basic scientists in the Department of Pathology, all of whom are leading projects that intersect with human genetics,” says Dr. Dan Gaston, a data scientist and assistant professor in the Department of Pathology who is working with Dr. Bedard to develop the program. “Once this program is operational, it will enable our faculty supervisors to acquire more funding for genetics projects, as they will have the formal structure supporting the graduate students who are essential for the conduct of research.”

The new graduate program will emphasize ethical, legal and societal issues around genetic testing, and the role of AI and machine learning in genetic and genomic data analytics. Drs. Bedard and Gaston anticipate that roughly half of the 20 to 30 graduate students in the Department of Pathology (at any given time) will select the genetics program option.