Monday 21 November 2016

Cardiac Staff Matters 21/11/16


1. Nancy Doern White, clinical dietitian in the Lipid Clinic at SBH, is retiring as of Dec 29th. A retirement tea in her honour will be held on Tuesday November 29th in CR3017 at 2 pm. Please join us in wishing her all the best in the future!

2. Lillian Hall, Manager of Quality and Patient Safety with the WRHA Cardiac Sciences Program, is also retiring! Her last day will be December 2, 2016. Lillian has been with the CSP since 2005 and has led staff and physicians program-wide in a variety of quality improvement projects and has guided the program’s initiatives to improve patient safety. Her knowledge, experience and dedication will be truly missed. Please join us as we wish her well in her well-deserved retirement!

3. Congratulations to Dr. Shelley Zieroth and Nurse Practioner Estrellita Estrella-Holder on their recent appointments to the Board of Directors of the Canadian Heart Failure Society. Dr. Zieroth (2nd from left, bottom row) will take on the role of Vice President and Estrellita (2nd from right, bottom row) is a Board Member.



4. We’d like to announce that Laura Ross will take over the position of Clinical Resource Nurse in the Intensive Care Cardiac Surgery (ICCS) unit at SBH next month. Congratulations and welcome, Laura!

5. Dr. Morley Cohen’s Albert Lasker Clinical Medical Research award has been placed in its permanent home in the lobby of the Asper Building! Donated by the Cohen family, the Lasker award was granted to Dr. Cohen and his colleagues in 1955 “For advances in cardiac surgery, making possible more direct and safer approaches to the heart.” We’re proud to display this lasting reminder of the efforts in the past that laid the foundation for the work we currently do and the advances we continue to seek.


Tuesday 8 November 2016

Cardiac Staff Matters 07/11/16


1. One of the presentations at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress meeting last week received widespread media attention! The project, titled: It’s Shockingly Cold: Defibrillator Shocks and Extreme Cold Weather, concluded that the risk of ICD shocks is higher with extreme and moderately cold weather, compared with warmer weather, and provides health care providers and patients with an awareness of the relationship between colder temperatures and ventricular arrhythmias. The authors of the study were Dr. Justin Cloutier, Dr. Shuangbo Liu, Dr. James Tam and Dr. Colette Seifer. Dr. Cloutier was interviewed about this by CJOB, CBC’s Ismaila Alfa on Up to Speed, and CTV. Click to read CBC’s online story about this or to see the CTV television coverage. Congratulations to Drs. Cloutier, Liu, Tam & Seifer!

2. In 2015-16, over 1000 cardiac patients took advantage of the cardiac rehabilitation program offered within the WRHA. By and large, participants in the program benefited in numerous ways, including improvement in psychological symptoms, a reduction in total blood cholesterol, a decrease in waist girth, an increase in functional capacity & cardiovascular conditioning, and improvements in quality of life. Read more about this excellent program in the Cardiac Rehabilitation 2015-16 Annual Report.

3. On a lighter note:
Do you remember the famous Olympic skier Picabo Street (pronounced Peek-a-Boo)? Well, Picabo is not just an athlete. She is now a nurse currently working at an Intensive Care Unit of a large metropolitan hospital. She is not permitted to answer the hospital telephones any longer. It caused too much confusion when she would answer the phone and say, “Picabo, I.C.U.” LOL