Dr. Gerald Chan with patient Sister Merle Milligan

Sporting a twinkle in her eyes and a sharp wit, Sister Merle Milligan seems younger than her 90 years. Only her deliberate walk gives away her true age, yet she manages to keep pace very nicely for someone who has had two major surgeries in the past year.

“When I needed bowel surgery, I asked my family doctor to refer me to Dr. (Gerald) Chan. I like him very much; he tells it exactly as it is, which I prefer,” Sister Merle explains. “I had successful surgery in November of last year (at the Birchmount campus).”

Almost immediately upon waking from the anaesthetic, Dr. Christopher Li told her she needed a pacemaker for heart blockage.

“Two days post-op, I was transferred by ambulance to the General, and a pacemaker was implanted. I returned to the Coronary Care Unit at the Birchmount campus for about eight days where I was well cared for,” she recalls, adding that as a member of the Sisterhood of St. John the Divine, she was discharged home to the Convent Infirmary. 

“I’m a nurse by profession, so I was impressed with the proactive way I was passed through the system to a good outcome. I am very grateful.”

She specifically asked for Dr. Chan, a gastroenterologist, when she started having problems about three years ago.

Born in Hong Kong, Dr. Chan’s early life was strongly influenced by medicine.

“My mother was a doctor, and she told me to get into medicine. My younger sister is a medical specialist,” he explains. “We would follow our mother around the hospital and watched how she cared for her patients.”

Major advances in endoscopy in the 1980s convinced Dr. Chan to specialize in gastroenterology. After completing his internship at the University of Hong Kong in 1981, he became a medical officer for the Hong Kong government until 1991, when he started his residency at the University of Manitoba. He was a Senior Fellow in Gastroenterology at the University of Washington before launching his practice in Manitoba. Dr. Chan joined TSH in 1999 as a staff gastroenterologist at the Birchmount campus.

“This is a very friendly hospital, and all my colleagues are like friends,” Dr. Chan explains. 

Married with children, he enjoys playing the piano and, in recent years, has developed a strong interest in very early art and antiques.

“When you enjoy paintings, buildings and treasures created by people thousands of years ago, you get a true sense of endurance,” he explains. “They are not like the transient terms of life. As doctors, we always see life as a passage. When you see old, beautiful things, you realize they were created for future generations to enjoy.”