Good morning, TeamUHN!
It is a pleasure to connect with you across care, research, and education through this weekly CEO update – all in service of A Healthier World.
Key reminders and updates
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My sincere thanks to all TeamUHN members who worked to serve patients, colleagues, and their communities over the Civic Holiday weekend. Thank you for your commitment to delivering the very best care for the patients we are privileged to serve.
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A hearty TeamUHN welcome to Julie Quenneville, who takes the reins as UHN Foundation CEO today! Julie previously served as President and CEO of McGill University Health Centre Foundation, where she grew revenue by 350 per cent and won numerous accolades, and where the team she built was recognized by Waterstone's Human Capital as one of Canada's most admired corporate cultures. "In health care, philanthropy makes the difference between quality and excellence," she says. "I'm so honoured to have the opportunity to contribute to the level of excellence at UHN." We are thrilled to have this change agent and leader on our team and look forward to working together to take UHN to new global heights. Get to know the new UHN Foundation CEO by reading this
"10 Questions" piece from UHN Foundation. And, as always, we thank both UHN Foundation and Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation for their indelible support as UHN moves to build A Healthier World.
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Happy retirement to UHN respiratory therapist John (J.R.) Rudyk after 40 years of dedicated service. After studying at the Toronto Institute of Medical Technology, a precursor to the Michener Institute of Education at UHN, John began his career in 1983 at Toronto General. John was part of the first successful lung transplant in North America that year and the 3000th lung transplant completed earlier this year. "There are ups and downs in every job, but… I consider myself very lucky, because I got to work with such amazing people, both when I was a student and a staff member," he told UHN News. "There hasn't ever been a day where I didn't want to go into work." Congratulations, J.R. We hope the next chapter is filled with family, friends, golfing, and fishing.
Read more about his remarkable career on UHN News.
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The Institute for Education Research (TIER) at UHN recently hosted "Driving Diversity in the Scientific Workforce," a forum in partnership with Elsevier to discuss building more inclusive educational and research environments. More than 50 leaders and experts participated in the July 26 event. UHN leadership, Drs. Brian Hodges and Brad Wouters stressed the need for diversity and inclusivity in scientific research and education to drive innovation. Dr. Kelly Mack, President for Undergraduate STEM Education and Executive Director of Project Kaleidoscope at the Association of American Colleges & Universities, delivered an inspiring keynote encouraging diversity at all academic levels. Judy Verses, President of Academic and Government Markets at Elsevier, also highlighted the role of publishing houses in promoting diversity, and Aman Sium, Vice-President of Experience, Transformation, and Social Accountability at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, shared personal experiences on social accountability in healthcare. Stay tuned for TIER's upcoming flagship lecture featuring Dr. Marzyeh Ghassemi from MIT on Machine Learning in health care and inclusivity in the scientific workforce.
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A new study from the Ted Rogers Centre for Health Research at the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre at UHN suggests variability in readmission rates for heart failure (HF) patients cannot be explained by spending, risk of mortality, or comorbidities. Study lead, Dr. Farid Foroutan, told UHN News the comprehensive analysis of 1.5 million HF patients marked the first global comparison of readmission rates for this population. Researchers found that 13.2 per cent of HF patients were readmitted within 30 days, and 35.7 per cent were readmitted within the year, with mortality rates of 7.6 per cent and 23.3 per cent, respectively. "We also found significant variability across countries that may not be simply explained by a country's health care spending, mortality rates, or HF comorbidities," Dr. Foroutan told UHN News. HF affects 64 million people worldwide and is a leading cause of hospitalization in the U.S. and Europe. Read the study online and learn more on UHN News.
Closing Notes
The KITE Research Institute has introduced a visually stunning new website to promote the services of its creative services team at KITE Studio. The
new website showcases featured projects created by KITE's full-service creative team, which offers a range of photography, graphic design, videography, and branding services to internal and external clients. Revenues generated by the team support research at KITE, a world-leader rehabilitation research home to more than 100 scientists working to help people living with the impacts of aging, disability, and illness. Learn more about this one-of-a-kind social enterprise here.
Calling all clinical operations staff within primary care teams! Do you work in one or more of the following roles: clinical administrative staff, medical office assistant, clinical support staff, manager, or unit clerk? If so, we want you to participate in a grant evaluation process by sharing valuable insights on how to improve training for interprofessional collaboration. To express our gratitude for your time, participants will be provided with an honorarium of $50. If interested, please email Victoria at Victoria.Hayrabedian@uhn.ca and consider sharing it with your team's clinical operations staff.
Have your say and help shape a new UHN Quality & Safety Strategic Plan. Share your thoughts on priorities for improvement by taking this brief survey today. Share further ideas at another virtual town hall on August 15th from 12-1pm. Enter your email to be sent the meeting-invite, and contact Sarah.Tosoni@uhn.ca or Lucas.Chartier@uhn.ca for more information.
And now.. our
video of the week. This clip highlight's UHN's award-winning Telemonitoring program – an innovative, cost-effective way to remotely monitor patients and keep them safe while in hospital.
Feedback?
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Have a good week,
Kevin
