October is Occupational Therapy Month in Canada. Occupational Therapy is a health profession that empowers people of all ages to overcome barriers in their everyday lives so they can do more and live better. Through solutions created for each individual’s unique needs, Occupational Therapists (OTs) help people of all ages and abilities recover from an injury or illness to participate in day-to-day activities, and experience life to the fullest. An OT works with the patient, their family member, or a health care team to identify and address the problems the patient may have with everyday activities. Together, the patient and their OT find solutions that will enable the patient to maintain function, regain skills, develop new skills and much more.
Thank you to all of the amazing Occupational Therapists at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre and St. Joseph’s Care Group for their contributions to patient care. Happy OT Month!
Are you interested in learning more about Occupational Therapy? Visit the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists website at https://www.caot.ca.
Patient and Family Centred Care (PFCC) is the philosophy that guides what we do, every day, to deliver exceptional care for every patient, every time. Working together with our patients and families, we are proud of the many initiatives developed and put into practice at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre (TBRHSC) to help improve the patient experience.
In celebration of 14 successful years of PFCC, TBRHSC is hosting a week-long series of events called Sharing & Caring Together.
The first four days of the week will cater to Hospital staff, while the Main Exhibition on Friday, October 27 (10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. in Auditorium A/B, 3rd Level) is open to patients, staff, volunteers, and the community. This event will highlight the ideas, initiatives and various ways that TBRHSC incorporates PFCC into our daily practices. Food and beverages will be available and attendees will be eligible for prize draws. Admission is FREE.
For more information, please contact TBRHSC.PFCC@tbh.net or call (807) 684-7322.
Each year, more than 100,000 Canadians receive life-saving care in intensive units, relying on the support and care of intensive care teams.
This Canadian Intensive CareWeek(October 22-28), we would like to celebrate and thank intensive care professionals across the country – including the amazing team at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre – for everything they do to help patients and families in their most critical moments.
We recognize the exceptional work undertaken by the multidisciplinary team in our ICU, which includes physicians, respiratory therapists, pharmacists and critical care nurses. They work together to help patients recover from serious injury or illness. They see patients at a time in which they are the most vulnerable and provide critical care and life support with compassion and professionalism.
Join us in thanking these health care professionals for everything they do!
Yesterday, staff at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre may have received an email with the subject line, ‘Corporate Policy Review Declaration content change‘. Please disregard this email as it was sent in error.
We want to hear your ideas during Patient Safety Week! Help to inform our next Patient Safety Plan by clicking on the Slido link below, or by scanning the QR code with your smart phone, and sharing your thoughts:
If you have any questions, reach out to the Patient Safety Improvement Specialist, Terry Fodë, by calling extension 6754 or emailing Terry.Fode@tbh.net.
Our Hospital is joining others across the country by celebrating Respiratory Therapy Week from October 22-28.
Respiratory therapists (RTs) are highly-skilled health care professionals. They have specialized medical expertise and use their knowledge and skills to provide safe, high-quality care. If you have medical problems that may be caused by cardiorespiratory or respiratory-related issues, RTs are the experts who will work with you to diagnose, treat and manage your condition.
Within our Hospital there are always RTs working hard 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, across all patient populations. RTs are a vital part of the front-line care team in many areas including the intensive care unit, the emergency department, operating rooms, NICU, outpatient clinics and home care. RTs perform a variety of vital roles throughout our Hospital. They are called for all high-risk deliveries including C-sections, traumas, conscious sedations, cardioversions, puffer administration and education, arterial blood gases, insertion of arterial catheters, non-invasive mechanical ventilation, (like CPAPs or BiPAPs), high flow oxygen therapy, and so much more.
Photo (from L-R): Jennifer Gadioma, Interprofessional Educator; Jason Walt, Special Projects and Education; Darolyn Hryciw, RRT Charge; Bruno Tassone, Critical Care and Respiratory Services Coordinator.
Leadership Roles for RTs
Respiratory therapists use their skills and knowledge to take on various leadership roles throughout our Hospital. Darolyn Hryciw is the RRT (Registered Respiratory Therapist) Charge and her role consists of managing day-to-day operations, scheduling, and equipment and supplies management. Bruno Tassone is the Critical Care and Respiratory Services Coordinator. He is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the Regional Critical Care Response Team (RCCRT) as well as the Medical Emergency Team. Jennifer Gadioma is an Interprofessional Educator. She is responsible for hospital-wide education to all staff. Shawn Jacobson is the Education Lead and he organizes all the education and clinical placements for the Respiratory Therapy students from Canadore College. Jason Walt does special projects for the Respiratory Therapy department, including educating staff and developing policies. Aaron Giba is the Professional Practice Lead for the Respiratory Department, and provides leadership and guidance in everyday practice as well as policy development and implementation.
Photo (from L-R): Brittney Goral RRT; Samantha Nigro RRT and AA; Darolyn Hryciw RRT, AA and Charge RRT; Leanna Black RRT and AA.
Operating Room
The anesthesia assistant (AA) is an essential member of the Operating Room (OR) team. AAs are respiratory therapists who have an additional 18 months of training in advanced anesthesia skills in order to facilitate the administration of anesthetic services, both in an out of the OR. Within the OR, they assist with the setup and induction of anesthesia for more complex surgical cases. Their duties include advanced airway management, line insertion as well as assistance with epidural/spinal blocks, peripheral nerve blocks and difficult intubation protocols. AAs can prepare and administer a variety of anesthetic agents and manage stable patients under anesthesia while the anesthetist performs other duties within the OR. They also maintain and troubleshoot all anesthesia equipment and are often called upon to assist with anesthetic emergencies. They prepare the OR for malignant hyperthermia cases and are well-versed in the management of this rare but life-threatening emergency. Outside of the OR, AAs set up and assist with sedation cases in diagnostic imaging that require advanced monitoring and generally facilitate any off-service anesthetic duty. The introduction of AAs have allowed anesthesia services to expand at a time when anesthesia resources are very limited.
Photo (from L-R): Jordan Zanatta, FT Lab; Dave Korpeski PFT and Stress Lab; Dennis Poulin PFT lab; Loriana Manion Stress. Lab.Photo (from L-R): Alana Bailey, RRT; Taylor Dewal, RRT; Jordan Zanatta, RRT; Steve Meagher, RRT.
Outpatient clinics, Stress lab, Pulmonary Function Testing lab
Respiratory therapists also provide care in outpatient clinics and our diagnostic area. They conduct tests to measure lung function and teaching people to manage asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder among other cardiac and lung functions.
Registration is required to attend this event. Click HERE.
As Canada’s health care system struggles with workforce challenges, surgical backlogs, wait times, and optimizing unnecessary interventions, technology adoption and the shift to delivering digital care improves access to care, the patient experience, and enables higher-value care models. Due to the staff and resource intensive approach of traditional device-based Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) that can only be used for a small percentage of patients, leading healthcare organizations are adopting Digital Care Journeys to extend the benefits of RPM for broader populations such as surgery, women’s health, oncology and chronic care.
Hear how deploying a SaaS-based, EHR-integrated Digital Care Journey platform enables providers to scale engagement, monitor, and stay connected with all patients throughout their healthcare journeys, discharge patients sooner, increase surgical throughput and enable safer transitions from hospital to home. The discussion will cover how the platform delivers interactive patient education and workflows that self guide patients through their personalized care journeys and how care teams have access to real-time dashboards to remotely monitor patient progress, get alerted to patients at-risk and leverage population level insights to improve care.
You’ll learn how:
Combining evidence-based, clinical content with digital guidance for patients from pre-admission through post-discharge recovery leads to lower LOS, ED visits, readmissions, phone calls, and costs.
Digitally-enabled, patient-self-management workflows allow 80%+ of patient issues to be addressed without remote monitoring by a provider – reducing phone calls.
Orchestrating a system-wide integration and rollout of a digital care solution with your EHR and patient portal streamlines clinical workflows and efficiencies.
Presented by:
Dr. Joshua Liu is a physician turned entrepreneur. He is currently the CEO and Co-founder of SeamlessMD, which provides the leading Digital Care Journey platform for health systems to engage, monitor and stay connected with patients across healthcare journeys.
Joshua graduated as a medical doctor from the University of Toronto. During his medical training, he co-led a research project at UHN on hospital readmissions and sat on UHN’s physician advisory group for post-hospital discharge follow up. As a result, Joshua was inspired to develop technology to better support patients and prevent adverse outcomes such as a readmission – which ultimately led to him co-founding SeamlessMD.
An advocate for healthcare innovation, Joshua has served as Chair of the Canadian Medical Association’s Joule Innovation Council and on the Advisory Group to the Office of the Chief Health Innovation Strategist for the Ontario Ministry of Health. Joshua has received numerous honours, including being named Digital Health Executive of the Year by Digital Health Canada, Forbes 30 Under 30 in Science and Healthcare, and Canadian Top 20 Under 20.
Dr. Liu holds a MD from the University of Toronto and a BSc from York University.
Caroline Fanti is the Director of the Regional Surgical Services at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre. Her educational background includes a Masters in Health Management, completion of the Rotman NW LHIN Health Leadership Program, an Honour’s Bachelor of Science in Physical Therapy and an Honour’s Bachelor of Science in Human Kinetics.
Caroline’s passion lies with the development and implementation of innovative regionally integrated programs and best practice models of care for patients of Northwestern Ontario. Programs such Centralized Intake, Rapid Access Clinics, Remote Patient Monitoring and Bundled Care leverage leading edge technologies, efficient use of resources, virtual care and inter-professional care teams to connect patients with the most appropriate specialists; provide the right care at the right time; decrease wait times, support admission avoidance; optimize patient flow; and ensure personalized transitions of care.
Through successful engagement of urban, rural and remote health system partners, Caroline has played an instrumental role in regional care system planning in order to champion capacity building and intelligent health system transformation. Caroline received the RBC Innovation Hero of the Year in 2021.
Andriana Lukich is the Director, Digital Solutions at St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton. She holds a HBSc Kinesiology and an MBA from McMaster University, a PMP certification and is Prosci Change Management certified. Throughout her decade of healthcare experience, she has held multiple roles all focused on leading change initiatives and supporting staff and physicians through transformational projects.
How public health practitioners and researchers view the potential of AI to impact public health research and practice.
Speakers: Dr. Jaky Kueper, Dr. Laura Rosella, Dr. Dan Lizotte
Dr. Jaky Kueper, PhD, is a postdoctoral research associate who recently finished the first combined PhD in epidemiology and computer science at the University of Western Ontario. Her work integrates epidemiology and machine learning to use “everyday data” such as electronic health records to support primary health care and population health. Her PhD research was recognized by a CIHR Banting and Best Doctoral Fellowship and the Governor General’s Gold Medal. She also serves as the TechForward Fellow at the College of Family Physicians of Canada, leading initiatives related to artificial intelligence, family medicine, and compassionate care.
Dr. Laura Rosella, PhD is an Associate Professor in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, where she holds the Canada Research Chair in Population Health Analytics and leads the Population Health Analytics Lab, which focuses on developing methods and tools to use population-level data to inform health system decision-making. She holds Inaugural Stephen Family Research Chair in Community Health at the Institute for Better Health, Trillium Health Partners and scientific appointments at Vector AI Institute and the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society. In 2021, Dr. Rosella was inducted into the Royal Society of Canada’s College of New Scholars in recognition of international impact in advancing population health. She leads training at the Temerty Centre for Artificial Intelligence Research and Education in Medicine (T-CAIREM) and the Data Sciences Institute at the University of Toronto. Dr. Rosella leads a Pan-Canadian team that launched in 2022 known as AI for Public Health (AI4PH), which is focused on building capacity in AI and big data skills for transformative change in addressing population and public health challenges and understanding how these tools impact health equity
Dr. Dan Lizotte, PhD, is Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science and the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at The University of Western Ontario. His research aims to support health decision-making by developing and applying machine learning and statistical tools to new sources of data including electronic health records and social media to better support patients and health professionals, particularly in public health and primary health care. His methodological research combines machine learning, optimal sequential decision-making, and multiple objective optimisation. Dr. Lizotte has been formally teaching AI methods to a diverse set of students for over ten years, and he teaches the Public Health Informatics course for in the Schulich Interfaculty Program in Public Health at Western. He is also a member of the Rotman Institute of Philosophy at Western, and he has a strong interest in intersectionality and other critical social theory and how they should inform the development and deployment of AI tools that support health equity. He is currently working with the Alliance for Healthier Communities to develop tools for research and decision support.
This one-credit-per-hour Group Learning program meets the certification criteria of the College of Family Physicians of Canada and has been certified by the Continuing Education and Professional Development Office at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine for up to 1.00 Mainpro+ credits.
