McMaster family doctor recognized for excellence in medical education

Danielle O’Toole, an associate professor with McMaster University’s Department of Family Medicine, has won the 2024 CAME Certificate of Merit Award from the Canadian Association of Medical Education (CAME). This certificate recognizes the awardee’s commitment to medical education in Canadian medical schools.

O’Toole is a family physician at McMaster Family Practice, where she has also served as the education coordinator and Director of resident learning and remediation, and is being honoured for her contributions to medical education, research, and scholarship.

“Among those of us who have known Danielle since her residency, she has carried with her throughout her career trajectory a strong identity as a teacher. The passion she brings to the education of her patients, her students and her peers is contagious,” says Dale Guenter, professor of family medicine and faculty experience director with the department.

O’Toole’s dedication to teaching and medical education is evident in her achievements. She has written an evidence-based book summarizing guidelines on common topics in Family Medicine that is used for exam preparation and clinical practice. Family Medicine Notes is now in its eleventh edition, selling thousands of copies around the world each year.

She is committed to medical education scholarship, completing a Masters in Health Science Education as well as leading and collaborating on education-relevant research. One of her notable projects has been on indirect patient care activities (IPCA) in residency. With the knowledge from this research, O’Toole helped to develop an IPCA curriculum which was piloted and refined at McMaster, presented at College of Family Physicians of Canada Family Medicine Forum, and disseminated to programs across Canada.

The indirect patient care activities curriculum is only one of several important packages of curriculum and teaching tools that O’Toole has created. She also led the creation of a remediation toolkit for residents experiencing academic difficulty that is used widely across McMaster and beyond by individual preceptors and coaches. This toolkit allows preceptors to confidently support their learners in a systematic, sensitive, and evidence-based way.

Her exemplary leadership and contributions to the field has earned her the universal respect of her patients, her students, and her peers, truly embodying the department’s mission of primary care for better health and brighter world.

Congratulations Dr. O’Toole on this outstanding accomplishment!