Associate professor
Max Rady College of Medicine
Department of Psychiatry
University of Manitoba
Room PZ-107 PsycHealth Centre
771 Bannatyne Avenue
Health Sciences Centre
Winnipeg, Manitoba R3E 3N4
Polina Anang, MD, PhD, FRCPC
Leadership style
Families often embark on long journeys, requiring courage and determination, when seeking out help for their children. Consultation-liaison (CL) and outpatient mental health services (OMHS) in child and adolescent mental health work in an interdisciplinary collaborative model, combining the capacities of two family therapists, two occupational therapists, seven nurse therapists, and five child and adolescent psychiatrists to help youth and their caregivers to live life to their fullest potential.
As the service chief I promote team cohesion, I make sure that every team member is engaged in an active reshaping of our collaborative process towards a mutual vision of being there for each other, valuing our therapeutic community, and promoting the resilience of the families we have the privilege of supporting.
Teaching philosophy
In leadership, teaching and research my primary goal is to build respectful, mutually enriching relationships. I hope that learners will contribute to the conversation. I am teaching topics that I am passionate about, and I am striving to engage university students and community members in meaningful dialogues that will ignite their passion for advocacy, health equity, deep listening, emotional awareness, and cultural humility. I am looking to my mentors for guidance, and I replicate the kindness shared with me by providing mentorship, encouraging critical thinking, inviting curiosity and reflexivity.
Research
Research summary
Community-based participatory research (CBPR) with Indigenous youth emphasizes relationship building and patience. It highlights the questions that are relevant for each community, and engages community members in collaborating with scholars on design, implementation, and data analysis.
Decolonizing research means taking action to creating new ways of working together with communities. I am engaged in CBPR with Building on Strengths in Naujaat youth group in Nunavut, walking along Inuit youth reclaiming agency and ownership in suicide prevention, with Ndinawemaaganag Endaawaad youth formulating what health equity means to them, with Inuit Elders postulating what Inuit-centric mental health services would look like for Inuit living in Manitoba.
My second area of interest is exploring treatment options for youth with somatization (chronic pain and related disorders), as a clinician scientist I am passionate about bringing in voices from the families in our care to the ears of policy makers.
My vision is to establish an integrated care service model for youth, combining the expertise of physiotherapists, occupational therapists, family therapists, nurses, adolescent medicine, general paediatricians and paediatric specialists, psychologists and psychiatrists to prove how much more cost effective this model will be and how much it will improve the quality of life of families confused by medical providers working in silos.
-
Research affiliations
Partner, Ndinawemaaganag Endaawaad Inc.
Partner, Ongomiizwin Indigenous Institute of Health and Healing
Keywords
- chronic pain
- conversion disorders
- health equity
- Indigenous youth wellbeing
- resilience
- somatization
- suicide prevention
-
Research groups
Principal investigator, Achieving Health Equity through a Partnership between Urban Indigenous Youth and the University of Manitoba Psychiatry Training Program
Principal investigator, Research groups, Building on Strengths in Naujaat: A Youth Initiative
Principal investigator, In Real Life: Involving People with Lived Experience in Psychiatry Education
Co-investigator, Qanuinngitsiarutiksait 2: Developing tools for the wellness and safety of Inuit
Co-investigator, Resident Psychotherapy Outcome Project): Evaluating the efficacy of resident-delivered psychotherapy in the Department of Psychiatry
Grants
2023:
- Canadian Institutes of Health Research Project Grant ($1,954,576) for Qanuinngitsiarutiksait.2: Developing tools for the wellness and safety of Inuit, Co-Investigator, with Lavoie J, Clark W, Dederick J as Principle Investigators
- Department of Psychiatry Academic Projects Award for “Chronic Pain and Psychiatric Comorbidity in Children and Adolescents” ($10,000). In collaboration with Young M, PGY5
- Recipient of Health Sciences Centre Allied Health Grant ($22,293) for “Co-creation of knowledge translation tools to improve the management of chronic pain in children and youth”, with Wittmeier K, Gerhold K, Brown C et al.
2022:
- Achieving health equity through partnership between urban Indigenous youth and University of Manitoba psychiatry training program. In collaboration with Ndinawemaaganag Endaawaad Inc., Katz C, PGY 6, Krueger N, PGY3
- Building on Strengths in Naujaat – a Youth Initiative. Community Based Participatory Research to increase sense of purpose and enhance resilience in Inuit youth in Naujaat, Nunavut. With Bronson M, Gottlieb N, Gordon E, Tegumiar K, Uttak V & Naujaat youth group
- R-POP (Resident Psychotherapy Outcome Project): Evaluating the efficacy of resident-delivered psychotherapy in the Department of Psychiatry, in collaboration with Fleisher W, Boman J, Morrissette M, Harvey T, PGY5
Biography
Brief bio
Dr. Polina Anang is a mother, a daughter, a friend, a sister, a mentor, a certified child and adolescent psychiatrist, an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, and service chief, consultation-liaison/outpatient mental health services, in child and adolescent mental health, Health Sciences Centre, in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Dr. Anang is a community psychiatrist in Naujaat, Nunavut, with Ongomiizwin Health Services, and co-founder of Building on Strengths in Naujaat youth resilience group. Her research reflects her passion for health equity, collaboration, and youth engagement. She is interested in reflexivity, intersectionality, and relationship building between academic centres and community organizations.
Dr. Anang is co-facilitating Brain-Body Connection Groups for youth with somatization and their caregivers. She is an active member of the Integrated Care for Youth working group at Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg.
From 2020-2024 Dr. Anang served as the prairies representative on the board of directors of Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. She enjoys supervising psychiatry residents in psychodynamic psychotherapy. From 2011-2018 she co-facilitated a Balint group for psychiatry residents, psychiatrists, psychologists, and allied health professionals.
Education
Subspecialty training in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (2013)
Residency in Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, University of Manitoba (2008-2013)
Residency in Psychosomatic Medicine, Charite University affiliated hospitals, Berlin, Germany (2002-2006)
PhD Psychosomatic Medicine, Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany (1998-2003)
Doctor of Medicine, Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany (1995-2002)
Awards
2023
Community Engagement Award, University of Manitoba
2020
Best Paper Award for Ethical Dilemmas in CBPR at the 18th Annual Research Forum, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, Max Rady College of Medicine, University of Manitoba
2018
Learning and Innovation Award, Ongomiizwin Indigenous Institute of Health and Healing, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Manitoba
2013
Resident Teacher of the Year from the Department of Psychiatry, University of Manitoba
2010
Gustavo Lage Award for Best Psychotherapy Related Paper at Resident Research Day, Department of Psychiatry, University of Manitoba
Contact us
Psychiatry
PZ433-771 Bannatyne Avenue
University of Manitoba, Bannatyne campus
Winnipeg, MB R3E 3N4 Canada
204-787-7056
204-787-4879