N. Ont medical school dean given Order of Australia

Australia will honour the dean of the Northern Ontario School of Medicine.

The country is naming Dr. Roger Strasser to the Order of Australia — one of that area's highest civilian honours.

Strasser, who hails from Australia, will receive the appointment Tuesday from Australia’s Acting High Commissioner Bruce Soar.

According to a press release issued by NOSM, Strasser will be honoured for his service to medicine, through improving the health care of people living in rural and remote communities in developed and developing nations — as an educator, researcher, and practitioner.

Strasser was selected as the founding dean in 2002 to create the newest medical school in Canada in over 30 years. NOSM was designed as a joint initiative of Lakehead University in Thunder Bay and Laurentian University in Sudbury. It has two main campuses that are 1,200 kilometers apart.