A dedicated volunteer, mentor and community coach, Andrews is also an accomplished Huskie student-athlete who helped USask's women's track and field team capture an incredible seventh consecutive conference title this year. But that is not the most impressive chapter of her story.

While juggling packed academic and athletic schedules, Andrews was named a five-time Academic All-Canadian (for averaging over 80 per cent with a full course load) who was recognized as one of the top students (97 per cent average) in the College of Kinesiology in her final year of undergraduate studies, before going on to earn the prestigious Reuben Brant Award for outstanding academic achievement in her first year in the College of Medicine. But in some ways, that is also not the most inspiring aspect of her story.

You see, Andrews has accomplished all of this and more while battling chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) — a type of cancer that affects the blood and bone marrow — since being diagnosed as a teenager.

"I was still young when I was diagnosed — I was turning 15 — and I think at the time I didn't have the maturity to understand the complexity of my situation," said Andrews, who recently celebrated her 25th birthday. "That was something that I developed as I got older and more athletically inclined and interested in the medical field. It affects my life every single day, so prioritizing health is very important and to have a support system of individuals to remind me of that is very helpful. It always has some impact on my athletic performance, and my life. And I am fortunate to have great coaches and teammates, and friends and family, who are always there for me."

Andrews capped the fifth and final year of her Huskie career as a team captain by racing to personal best times in the 60 metres and 200m. But her impact on the program has gone far beyond her performance on the track, serving as a mentor and a role model for younger members of the Huskie program.

"I have personally witnessed over her years with the team, the highs and lows of the cancer side of things and her perseverance and attitude is truly remarkable," said Huskies head coach Jason Reindl. "She has been dealing with medication changes and a number of health aspects that made training and competing at this level of sport a success story in its own right. But to do it all with the amount of academic success and community involvement that she has had, well let's just say that I have been privileged to have a number of amazing individuals in our program, but Brianna is in a class of her own."

As she begins her third year of studies in USask's medicine program this fall, Andrews is also giving back to the community as a volunteer and a coach, and offering her time outside of classes on campus to work on a trio of ongoing research projects at USask.

"I am an individual who likes to be busy and I take a lot on at all times, so I think finding a passion is what drives my interest in so many things," said Andrews. "My biggest thing is when I engage in something, I want to be passionate about it. Medicine of course is a field that is important to me, and being an athlete, coach, and volunteer is as well. And with that, there is knowing when I need to prioritize certain tasks and how to balance all these things that I am passionate about in my life."

One of her passions is helping guide the next generation of young track and field athletes in the sport she loves. Andrews helped start the Running Wild Athletics Club in Saskatoon in 2019, and continues to serve as a coach, volunteer and mentor with the club that welcomes all youth, with a particular focus on providing opportunities for Indigenous athletes in the city and in rural regions.

"The most rewarding part of sport is being able to give back what you've learned and it's very rewarding to see individuals be excited to train, run, compete, and take your advice and achieve something that they have been working for," said Andrews, whose volunteer contributions also include elementary school visits, working with people with disabilities, promoting women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM), advocating for accessible and equitable reproductive health care, and supporting wellness and mental health, including serving as a peer mentor and wellness committee member in the College of Medicine.

"Giving back is a big part of my outlook on life, whether that is in sport or in the community," she said. "Life is unpredictable and you don't know what it is going to throw at you, so I feel when an opportunity presents itself, it is important to take it."

Despite the extensive workload involved in the MD program, Andrews is also committed to contributing to medical research at USask, after hours and over the summers. She volunteers her time on a variety of projects, including a vascular surgery/hematology research study proposal, and another assessing and addressing the needs of patients and donors and their families with regards to kidney organ donation/transplantation. Andrews also serves as a volunteer research student with the Saskatchewan Cancer Agency studying outcomes of bone marrow transplant in acute myeloid leukemia and myelodysplastic syndrome, a project that is personal for her in her battle with cancer. The thought of improving treatment and outcomes for patients like herself helps drive her dedication to these projects.

"The research is personal to me, but also something I enjoy because it is a newfound area of knowledge and there is so much to explore and discover," said Andrews, who has earned more than a dozen scholarships during her time at USask and earned a Bachelor of Science in Kinesiology with Honours and Great Distinction in 2022. "But as with all research, it's a slow process, yet you are always hopeful that your work will help contribute to improved treatments and better outcomes."

Andrews experienced both dangerous setbacks and promising progress in her own struggle with cancer during her athletic career, with some of her Huskie teammates not even knowing the battle she was facing.

"I did relapse at one point, that was about four years ago at the time when the Canada Summer Games rolled around and I dropped out of team trials," she said. "You can kind of tell when something is wrong … I had been off medication at that point because I had been doing well prior, but there is always a risk of relapsing and I fell in that category. Having relapsed once, we are very careful with ever going off medication again."

Thankfully, Andrews has responded well to her new medication, which was only recently approved for Canadian cancer patients.

"The medication I'm on right now wasn't initially approved for use in Canada, but I was approved via a compassionate-use program. Receiving the medication has been life-changing, personally and athletically, and for my values (cancer cells carrying the genetic mutation)," she said. "I have been on this for about two and a half years now, still with some hiccups, but overall I am much more stable and I feel better, which did contribute to improved athletic performance during my last year with the Huskies."

With two years left in the MD program, Andrews is still weighing her options for her future as a doctor, whether to serve as a family physician, or specialize in hematology and blood disorders, or to work in obstetrics (labour and delivery).

"I have a hematology elective in October that I was accepted for, so that will allow me to gain more experience in that clinical area and learn more about what day-to-day life is like as a hematologist," she said. "I think in any specialty, I would like to be involved in multiple areas and that is where family practice comes in. My family practitioner is actually the individual who first identified a change in my blood counts and then referred me to a specialist. So I think family medicine is very special because it has components of so many different areas of medicine and is connected to so many aspects of individuals' lives."

Andrews recently celebrated a medical milestone of sorts in her own life, with those closest to her at home in Saskatoon, a decade after being first diagnosed with leukemia.

"CML is treated with oral chemotherapy agents, so I have been on a chemo agent since I was diagnosed on July 3, 2015," she said. "We just celebrated 10 years, with family and friends. It seems a bit ironic that I am celebrating a diagnosis date, but the type of leukemia that I have is incurable. CML originates in the bone marrow due to a genetic mutation, so I will always have it and I won't have a definitive remission date to celebrate, per se. But I am responding well to my new medication. And something I have learned in these first two years of medicine is knowing when to take a step back when I have taken on too much, as well as asking for help and support when I need it. And my family and friends and my Huskie coaches (Reindl and Todd Johnston) and my training partners have always been there for me and I am so appreciative of that."

Reindl said Andrews has been a one-of-a-kind leader and inspiration for her teammates, and a remarkable role model for the Huskies program.

"What Brianna brought to the team is incredible and she always put everyone else ahead of her," he said. "She is someone who without hesitation would do anything to support her teammates. And when I speak of academic excellence, she was, and continues to be, a shining light … But these aspects are just a snapshot of her, combined with her athletics, showing up every day to practice and competing to the best of her abilities, even when she wasn't at her best. She never used it as an excuse and always found a way to do her best, which in itself is a message that needs to be repeated in today's ultra-competitive, having-to-be-perfect, landscape."