A Developing Situation

When Heather Patterson, an emergency physician in Calgary, found herself feeling increasingly detached from her work, after yet another gruelling shift, she knew something had to change. She had been a doctor for a decade and had a busy life as a forty-one-year-old married mother of two. Was she experiencing a typical mid-life malaise about her occupational choice, an unease made worse by the realization that the many years required for medical training had restricted any alternative career routes? Or was she simply among the roughly 70 percent of emergency physicians who experience burnout?

At her husband’s suggestion, Patterson turned to an old passion, photography, to recharge. She dreamed of creating a “wellness-based project” that could rejuvenate both her love of medicine and her empathy for patients, as well as that of her colleagues. This was in January 2020. She had no idea...