Dr. Lalita Malhotra and her late husband Dr. Tilak Malhotra will be celebrated at the annual Doctor's Gala in April. (submitted photo/ VHF)

By Glenn Hicks

legacy giving

P.A. doctor and late husband to be honoured by hospital foundation

Jan 3, 2020 | 4:48 PM

A doctor who has already left a four-decades-long legacy in Prince Albert will be honoured at the Victoria Hospital Foundation’s (VHF) 5th Annual Doctor’s Gala in April.

Pediatrician and family physician Dr. Lalita Malhotra, as well as her late husband Dr. Tilak Malhotra, who died in 2017, will be acknowledged for their many years of service, extraordinary efforts and personal generosity while delivering crucial healthcare in P.A. and around the region. The VHF called the Malhotras “our community’s long-time pediatric and obstetric team.”

Speaking to paNOW, Malhotra said she was honoured and humbled that she and her late husband should be the focal point of the event April 18.

“P.A. is home and the whole North is my home, and all my patients have been my family all along,” she said. “I love being with them and so did my husband; he connected with everybody so well.”

According to a media release from the VHF, Tilak Malhotra arrived in the city in 1975 and became the first and only pediatrician for nearly 20 years. He and Lalita were the first maternal and pediatric physician team in the North. Such was their impact on young families, and particularly in the First Nations communities, the foundation said Lalita was bestowed with the nickname “Angel of the North.”

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The Malhotras’ impact on the community has transcended their significant medical contributions. In early 2019 Lalita donated $800,000 toward the $2.2 million fundraising campaign for the Neo-Natal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) that, once constructed, will be a leading-edge department at the Victoria Hospital.

For her, the new facility’s specially designed accommodation right next to the newborns’ crib is a major factor and will be an advantage because those infants needing specialist intensive care will no longer have to go to Saskatoon.

“The mothers have a home here, they have relatives in P.A., so for me that was the most important thing, that the moms don’t get separated from their babies,” Malhotra said.

It’s a testament to the impact the Malhotras have had in their profession and on the wider community that many of Lalita’s current patients are the children and grand children of the citizens she helped bring into the world.

Meanwhile, the CEO of the VHF Sherry Buckler said she was excited to be celebrating the Malhotras as a medical team and Lalita being the first woman to be honoured at the Doctor’s Gala. And she added their financial contribution to the NICU project fundraising and therefore to the community’s future, was powerful.

“Considering they looked after many of us when we were tiny and born and now they’re going to leave this amazing legacy for the future generations, it’s magical, and means so much to this community and the northern families,” Buckler said.

The new presenting sponsor of the foundation’s Doctor’s Gala are The Car Guys of Mann Northway GMC and the event is major part of annual fundraising efforts.

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glenn.hicks@jpbg.ca

On Twitter:@princealbertnow