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New board chair for Interior Health

Dr. Doug Cochrane appointed by provincial government
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Dr. Doug Cochrane is the new chair of the Interior Health board of directors. Image Credit: Contributed

Dr. Doug Cochrane has been appointed the new chair of the Interior Health board of directors.

Cochrane will be joined by new board members Dr. Selena Lawrie and Cindy Stewart.

Cochrane replaces current board chair Kamloops lawyer John O’Fee, while also stepping down will be board director Renee Wasylyk, of Kelowna.

The appointments were part of a shuffle to appoint four new board chairs and 11 new directors to health authorities across the province.

Cochrane is the chair and provincial patient safety and quality officer of the BC Patient Safety and Quality Council.

He is professor emeritus at the University of British Columbia in neurosurgery.

Previously, he chaired the BC Patient Safety Taskforce and has served as a member of the board of the Canadian Patient Safety Institute.

Dr. Selena Lawrie is a family physician and site director for the University of British Columbia Family Practice Residency Program in Kamloops.

Lawrie is also the president of Supporting Team Excellence with Patients Society and a steering committee member representative for the Ministry of Health in the Physicians Health Program.

Cindy Stewart is the retired president of the Health Sciences Association of B.C.

She was vice-president of the BC Federation of Labour and a member of the executive board of the National Union of Public and General Employees.

Stewart served as one of two labour representatives appointed to the joint advisory committee to the arbitration bureau, and was a member of an adjudication committee for one of Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council’s three 1999 strategic programs: Society, Culture and the Health of Canadians.

She holds a bachelor of science in rehabilitation medicine from the University of British Columbia and has worked as physiotherapist.

“The new and existing board chairs share a long history of public service, community work, and experience in the private sector, labour, health care and research,” said Health Minister Adrian Dix.

“Our goal as a government is to provide leadership for a strong, innovative and responsive public health-care system, and we are confident that these appointments will support this goal.”



Barry Gerding

About the Author: Barry Gerding

Senior regional reporter for Black Press Media in the Okanagan. I have been a journalist in the B.C. community newspaper field for 37 years...
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