Future doctors bring care closer to home in Mississauga mosque outreach

A young girl watches closely as Nabeel Mansuri places two fingers on an infant’s chest and begins counting out chest compressions.

Moments later, she takes over, pressing carefully into the plastic torso of a resuscitation mannequin as Mansuri and a team of medical students nod encouragement beside her inside the Sayeda Khadija Centre mosque. 

For Mansuri, a first-year MD student at Toronto Metropolitan University’s School of Medicine, the exercise is about more than teaching CPR. It is about building trust in healthcare—one conversation at a time. 

“What stood out most was seeing entire families stop, ask questions and really engage,” said Mansuri. “You had children learning CPR beside their parents and grandparents having conversations about primary care and health resources. It showed how meaningful it can be to bring health care directly into community spaces people already know and trust.”

About 2,000 people gathered at the Sayeda Khadija Centre in Mississauga on May 15 as part of a community outreach event organized by the TMU chapter of the Muslim Medical Association of Canada. Co-led by Mansuri and fellow MD student Talia Hassan, the event featured resuscitation demonstrations, information on team-based care, admissions and guidance on how residents can register to become patients at one of TMU’s Integrated Health Centres (IHC).

“I think the biggest thing we need is better health literacy and awareness,” said Mansuri. “A lot of people still don’t know resources like the IHCs exist, or that there are Muslim physicians within their own communities—people praying beside them, row by row, who understand their cultural needs and experiences. The support is there. Events like this are about helping people make that first connection to care.”

Mansuri’s own connection to Mississauga and the Sayeda Khadija Centre runs deep.

He moved to the city from Markham when he was eight years-old and later became one of the youngest board members of the Faith of Life Network, the broader organization that oversees the day-to-day operations of the Sayeda Khadija Centre.

During COVID-19, he spearheaded a food hamper program that provided food to marginalized families facing food insecurity as a result of the pandemic. Mansuri credits the mosque with inspiring him to pursue medicine to address some of the social determinants of health affecting his community.

“It’s really shaped me into becoming a better professional and a better humanitarian,” said Mansuri. “It’s made me want to go into medicine for exactly this reason—to come back and serve the Mississauga community that’s given so much to me, as a medical doctor.”

TMU’s inaugural class of MD students includes 20 students from Mississauga—nearly one in five of the 94-student cohort. The school is intentionally selecting students with a strong connection to the community, with the idea that those who train close to home are more likely to stay in the Peel Region when it comes time to enter practice.

The outreach event also reflected the School of Medicine’s broader emphasis on community-based care and improving access to primary healthcare services in underserved areas.

“This is community-centred care in action,” said TMU President and Vice-Chancellor Mohamed Lachemi. “By meeting people in trusted community spaces and connecting them to team-based primary care, our students are helping strengthen access to healthcare across Peel Region.”

That approach, school leaders say, is intentionally built into the design of TMU’s medical education model.

“This is a community-driven school by design,” said Sharanjeet Kaur, Chief Administrative Officer at the School of Medicine. “We recruit from the community, we train in this community, we engage the community at every step, and now there’s a real reciprocity. Our students are coming back to the same community that helped build this medical school.”

As the second prayer service ends, the mosque begins to clear out. For Mansuri, it’s his first moment to reflect on what the day was ultimately about.

It is not just about teaching a technique or explaining a health system, he said, but about trust—about making sure people recognize the support already available within their own community, and feel confident reaching for it.

“This is really about connection,” he said. “We’re showing people that care is already here, and it’s closer than they think.”

For the students leading the event, that connection now runs both ways: from community to classroom, and back again.