Geoffrey Blair

Clinical Professor Emeritus

Division: Pediatric Surgery

Email: geoffrey.blair@ubc.ca

Degrees & Certifications:

University of Toronto, Doctor of Medicine—MD 1977

Certification of the Canadian College of Family Physicians—CCFP 1979

Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Fellowship in General Surgery—FRCSC 1983

Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Certificate of Special Competence in Pediatric Surgery—1985

Leadership positions held:

University of British Columbia

  • Head, Division of Pediatric Surgery 1993-2002
  • Fellowship Training Program Director, Pediatric Surgery 1993-2003
  • Head, Department of Surgery at British Columbia Children’s Hospital 2001-2010
  • Program Director, Undergraduate Surgical Education 2010-2022

Nationally

  • President, Canadian Association of Paediatric Surgeons 2007-2009
  • Chair & Founding Lead, Pediatric Surgical Chiefs of Canada 2005-2010
  • Chair, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Specialty Committee in Pediatric Surgery 2006-2010
  • Chair, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Pediatric Surgery Examination Board 2007-2009
  • Chair, Canadian Medical Association Specialist Forum, 2014-2016
  • Chair, Canadian Undergraduate Surgical Education Committee 2016-2018
  • Founding Lead, Canadian Conference for the Advancement of Surgical Education (C-CASE) 2018

Awards:

Local & Provincial

  • 1992   Master Teacher Award, presented by University of British Columbia, Department of Surgery
  • 1994   H. Rocke Robertson Award for Surgical Undergraduate Teaching, presented by University of British Columbia Department of Surgery
  • 2016   UBC Medical Class of 2016 Teaching Excellence Award
  • 2017   Clinical Faculty Award for Excellence in Clinical Teaching, presented by the UBC Dean of Medicine
  • 2018   BC Children’s Hospital & Women’s Hospital Global Health Award- 2018
  • 2019   Dr. Parmeet Singh Award for Community Service in Pediatrics, presented by the BC Pediatrics Society
  • 2021   UBC Medical Class of 2021 Teaching Excellence Award

National

  • 2014   Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons Mentor of the Year Award for Region 1
  • 2019   John Provan Award for Outstanding Surgical Education presented by the Canadian Association of Surgical Chairs

International

  • 2018   Recognition Award for service from the Association of Surgeons of Uganda
  • 2023   American Academy of Pediatrics Arnold Salzberg Mentorship Award

Current Research Interests:

Surgical Education at the undergraduate and lay level

Notable

  • 2019-present—Project Lead for the National Undergraduate Surgical Learning Objectives (NUSLO) Project

2023— “A Pediatric Surgery Primer: a learning resource for medical students”, a free e-book adopted by the Canadian Association of Paediatric Surgeons (CAPS) and posted on the caps.ca website. Link: https://caps.ca/uploads/Pediatric%20Surgery%20Primer_CAPS_edition_5June2023.pdf