Ottawa Hospital

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Ottawa Hospital Foundation Public Service Breakfast – April 2013

My patient testimonial to help raise funds for the Ottawa Hospital.

Each of the stories was very powerful in its own way, reminding how fortunate we are to have such good medical care in our community.

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Ottawa Hospital to be first collection site in new public cord blood bank

A good initiative, starting in Ottawa, to help address the shortage of donors for stem cells. Quote:

OneMatch is currently trying to find matches for approximately 1,000 patients, but its match-success rate sits at 50 per cent, even with access to nearly 20 million donors worldwide and more than 500,000 sources of cord blood.

“The donors that we’re often not able to find a match for are very ethnically diverse and are (often) Aboriginal peoples — our First Nations, Inuit and Metis — because it’s such a unique population to Canada,” Smith said.

Smith hopes that will change once women understand what a donation could mean. Once the project starts, mothers delivering at the General and Civic campuses will be able to donate their cord blood.

Ottawa Hospital to be first collection site in new public cord blood bank.

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iPads In Health And Medicine: More Than An Information Revolution?

An update on iPad use in health. Imagine the latest iPad with its new screen will become even more useful, particularly for radiologists and others in imaging.

And my hospital in Ottawa continues to get mentioned. Still not seeing much of them in my clinic, however, but the article lists a number of ways they are being used.

I checked with a number of the doctors I know at my hospital: one noted that the applications were not as simple as he would have liked (he has his own personal iPad as well, another showed me all my clinical information and test results and allowed me to browse my records – which was impressive, and which he noted made life a lot easier for staff).

iPads In Health And Medicine: More Than An Information Revolution?.

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Engaged patients are healthier patients, ‘Frequent Flyers’

A bit general in approach, with less specifics on the how than I would have liked (common to many healthcare reform discussions – see Preston Manning’s Op-Ed on Discussitis interminabilis), but valid nevertheless. Also, given that this was by Jack Kits, CEO of my hospital, but in his capacity as chair of the Health Council of Canada, thought it worth posting.

While much needs to be done to make healthcare more patient-centred, engagement should be more at the prevention level – lifestyle, food, exercise – to reduce the need for healthcare services. We always fall into the trap about neglecting the prevention side, it would appear.

TheSpec – Engaged patients are healthier patients.

And a more practical illustration of the need for patient-centred care, and more attention on homecare and follow-up after discharge, and some examples of teams that are experimenting in this area.

Bit weird to use the ‘frequent flyer’ analogy here – and cuts a bit too close to home as my status has changed from an Air Canada frequent flyer to a healthcare frequent flyer!

We need to treat ‘million-dollar’ patients better – The Globe and Mail.

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Ottawa Hospital Now Uses 3000 iPads Alongside its Native Health Software

Update on my hospital’s use of iPads. While it does seem to being used by doctors on their rounds, not yet at the clinic level where my file is paper-based (in contrast to my notes etc on my iPad!).

Ottawa Hospital Now Uses 3000 iPads Alongside its Native Health Software | iPad in Canada Blog – Canada’s #1 iPad Resource.