“Being awarded the PSI Fellowship will allow me to spend more time to build my research program on improving the quality of healthcare for the millions of Canadians with peripheral artery disease. As a new investigator, it would jump start my career by giving me the time to focus on completing some early, high-impact, and potentially practice-changing work related to this goal. It would therefore catalyze my transition from being a trained surgeon and researcher into an independent surgeon-scientist who hopes to help transform peripheral artery disease care in Canada and internationally.

Approximately 10% of Canadians have peripheral artery disease (hardening, narrowing, and occlusion of the leg arteries). People with peripheral artery disease have a high risk of lower limb amputation, heart attack, stroke, and death. Clinical practice guidelines strongly recommend providing certain blood thinner, cholesterol reducing, and blood pressure lowering medications to people with peripheral artery disease because these medications reduce the risk of these adverse outcomes. However, international studies have reported that these medications are often markedly underprescribed to people with peripheral artery disease.

As the 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson KT Fellow, I aim to conduct a multi-phased, mixed-methods study to: 1) understand gaps in the prescription of and adherence to guideline-recommended cardiovascular medications among Ontarians with peripheral artery disease; 2) identify factors that may influence the prescription of guideline-recommended medications to Ontarians with peripheral artery disease; and 3) develop a tailored and evidence-informed implementation intervention to improve medication prescription by doctors and nurses. Ultimately, this implementation intervention could then be used as a template for other provinces and countries interested in performing similar interventions. My research team and I believe these types of interventions will significantly improve the health outcomes of people with peripheral artery disease and reduce their overall health resource use.” – Dr. Derek Roberts

Dr. Derek Roberts Awarded: 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

PSI Foundation is delighted to announce Dr. Derek Roberts of University of Ottawa as the 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellow.

About Dr. Derek Roberts

Dr. Derek Roberts is a vascular and endovascular surgeon and new investigator based in the Division of Vascular and Endovascular Surgery at The Ottawa Hospital and University of Ottawa. He completed a pharmacy degree (and practiced as a pharmacist) and an MD with Distinction at Dalhousie University; a residency in general surgery, the Clinician-Investigator and Surgeon-Scientist Programs, and a PhD in epidemiology with a focus on KT at the University of Calgary; the KT Canada Strategic Training in Health Research (STIHR) fellowship; and a fellowship in vascular and endovascular surgery at the University of Ottawa. The KT Canada STIHR Fellowship provided Dr. Roberts with rigorous graduate training in the science and practice of KT and made him one of the first surgeons or surgical trainees to complete formal training in KT in Canada. This training included completion of a KT-related PhD thesis and attendance or completion of monthly KT Canada seminars, twice-monthly research operations seminars, the annual KT Canada Summer Institute (two consecutive summers), and KT-related graduate courses.

Dr. Roberts was appointed as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Surgery on January 1st, 2021. He was then cross-appointed to the School of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Ottawa on September 1st, 2021 where he is approved to supervise MSc students and co-supervise PhD students. He currently spends 30% of his time conducting research (during which he has no clinical responsibilities) and 70% practicing vascular and endovascular surgery and providing direct patient care to patients with peripheral artery disease and other vascular surgical problems.

About Dr. Derek Roberts’ Research Program

The overarching objective of Dr. Roberts’ research program is to improve the quality of healthcare and outcomes for people with peripheral artery disease and several other vascular surgery problems. He began his career by using his research training to attempt to improve the perioperative outcomes of people with peripheral artery disease who require lower limb revascularization surgery. These surgeries are commonly-performed, high-risk, and costly procedures performed to improve quality of life and prevent leg amputation in people with peripheral artery disease. Dr. Roberts recently studied 20,988 patients who underwent lower limb revascularization surgery in Ontario. Study results were published in the prestigious British Medical Journal (BMJ). Use of neuraxial instead of general anesthesia was associated with decreased mortality, health care costs, and length of hospital stay. He is now using an integrated KT approach to involve stakeholders across Canada in the design of a multicenter pilot and then Canada-wide randomized controlled trial to test whether use of neuraxial instead of general anesthesia may improve the outcomes of PAD patients undergoing lower limb revascularization surgery.

Dr. Roberts now seeks to use his training in pharmacy, epidemiology, vascular and endovascular surgery, and KT to understand and subsequently reduce gaps in the use of guideline-recommended medications for people with peripheral artery disease. He will be conducting these studies alongside colleagues in the Division of Vascular and Endovascular Surgery at the University of Ottawa, members of the Canadian Society for Vascular Surgery, and world experts in KT at the University of Ottawa, including members of the Centre for Implementation Research ( http://www.ohri.ca/cir/) at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute.

About the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

Knowledge translation research aims at transitioning research discoveries to the real world to improve health outcomes. This prestigious fellowship – valued at $300,000 for over three years – helps protect a promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact translational research.

“I am delighted to receive a PSI KT Fellowship that will support the cutting edge work we are doing to help patients and health care providers maintain and improve lung health. I am impressed by the PSI Foundations forward-thinking dedication to knowledge translation – not just research, as well as its commitment to innovation and new ideas.” – Dr. Andrea Gershon

Dr. Andrea Gershon Awarded: 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

PSI Foundation is delighted to announce Dr. Andrea Gershon of Sunnybrook Research Institute as the 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellow.

This Fellowship will allow Dr. Gershon to further advance her research and knowledge translation program, Canadian Best Respiratory Research Evaluation and Analyst Team of Health Experts (CanBREATHE), conducting research and translating it to improved care for people with respiratory disease in Canada. She leads a diverse team of more than 70 researchers, clinicians, patients and other stakeholders to conduct such research and knowledge translation. Importantly, she also works closely with government, health districts, hospitals, health care providers and patients to translate their findings to quality, equitable care to improve lung health for all.

About Dr. Andrea Gershon

Dr. Andrea Gershon is a Respirologist and Senior Scientist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, University of Toronto and ICES. She is a well published CIHR-funded researcher as well as the COPD Associate Editor of the high impact journal CHEST.

Dr. Gershon’s award winning research investigates health outcomes, health services, and drug safety and effectiveness in individuals with respiratory disease. Her research and knowledge translation program uses real world data from millions of people to learn about the experiences of people with lung disease with a focus on vulnerable groups, including the elderly, those of lower socioeconomic status, and aboriginal peoples.

Dr. Gershon has published over 200 peer-reviewed articles. She has been an invited speaker at international meetings, universities, and medical centres worldwide. Her work is used by government and non-profit organizations where it informs international guideline and policy documents.

Dr. Gershon works with junior faculty, postgraduate fellows, graduate candidates, and other students at all levels of training. She loves supporting these future leaders, researchers and clinicians who will be central to the discovery and use of health-related knowledge to keep people well.

About the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

Knowledge translation research aims at transitioning research discoveries to the real world to improve health outcomes. This prestigious fellowship – valued at $300,000 for over three years – helps protect a promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact translational research.

“Poverty and other social determinants have enormous negative impacts on the health of young children and their families, which have been worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the long-term trusting relationships primary care providers develop with families, they are in a unique position to address social determinants of children’s health. The PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship will allow me to study primary care-embedded interventions addressing poverty, as well as the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on primary preventive care and health outcomes for young children.” – Dr. Imaan Bayoumi

Dr. Imaan Bayoumi Awarded: 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

PSI Foundation is delighted to announce Dr. Imaan Bayoumi of Queen’s University as the 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellow.

This Fellowship will allow Dr. Bayoumi to generate and disseminate evidence about impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on primary preventive care and health outcomes for young children and of primary care embedded
interventions (e.g. social service navigation) on parent and child health.

Poverty and other social determinants have a profound negative impact on the health of parents, children and families, contributing to substantial health disparities in parenting stress, mental health, and children’s general and social-emotional development. Primary preventive care in early childhood is fundamental to early detection and prevention of future health problems. As the first contact with the health system for most families, primary care providers are in a unique position to develop long-term trusting relationships, and to intervene to address social determinants of children’s health in clinical settings. During the COVID-19 pandemic, families have experienced increased stress with social isolation, increased food insecurity, disruptions to work, daycare and schools, and worsening parent mental health, all factors which are associated with poor child health and which create barriers to accessing preventive care.

About Dr. Imaan Bayoumi

Dr. Imaan Bayoumi is a Family Physician and Assistant Professor of Family Medicine at Queen’s University. She completed her MD at Queen’s University, Family Medicine training at McMaster University, and a Masters of Science in Health Research Methodology at McMaster University. She is an investigator with the TARGet Kids! primary care practice based research network for children ( https://www.targetkids.ca/) and a fellow at ICES. She is a member of the executive team of the Rourke Baby Record, the evidence-informed guide to preventive primary care for young children in Canada. She also co-leads Innovations for Community Resilience Equity and Advocacy (I-CREAte, https://www.queensu.ca/i-create/), a community based participatory action research initiative aimed at conducting action-oriented research to improve health and wellbeing of children and families. She is committed to collaborating with parents, community partners, professional bodies and policy makers to carry out equity oriented, meaningful research.

About the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

Knowledge translation research aims at transitioning research discoveries to the real world to improve health outcomes. This prestigious fellowship – valued at $300,000 for over three years – helps protect a promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact translational research.

“There is somewhat of a disconnect between medical training and consultant level work. While a trainee, we constantly evaluate individual performance to move clinicians towards better habits and more robust practice. With competency-based education, this focused is heightened. Yet once physicians enter practice, this formative feedback comes to an abrupt end. Providing clinicians with their individual practice data is an essential beginning yet falls short of meaningful and sustained practice change. If we are going to improve clinical practice, we must design peer exchange experiences, educational interventions and coaching which bring practice data to the next level. It is not enough to know things should change, it’s about providing clarity on how this could be done.” – Dr. Shawn Mondoux

Dr. Shawn Mondoux Awarded: 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

PSI Foundation is delighted to announce Dr. Shawn Mondoux of McMaster University as the 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellow.

Through this Fellowship, Dr. Mondoux aims to change clinical practice through augmented data feedback, using interviews, peer learning methods, and clinical coaching to improve clinical care metrics.

Making healthcare safer and a doctor’s practice better starts with providing each doctor with good quality data about their medical practice. Dr. Mondoux has created such a system that compares a doctor’s practice with peer doctor who work in the same setting. But improvement needs more than data. This Fellowship will allow Dr. Mondoux to develop new education, peer coaching and data sharing programs to make sure that the data is used as best as possible.

About Dr. Shawn Mondoux

Dr. Shawn Mondoux is an Emergency Physician at St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton (SJHH) and an Assistant Professor at McMaster University. He graduated with a B.Eng. in Aerospace Engineering, completed his medical training at the University of Ottawa in the Royal College stream of Emergency Medicine and completed a MSc of Quality Improvement and Patient Safety at the University of Toronto. Dr. Mondoux currently serves as the Quality and Safety Lead of the Emergency Department and is a corporate Innovation Lead at SJHH.

About the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

Knowledge translation research aims at transitioning research discoveries to the real world to improve health outcomes. This prestigious fellowship – valued at $300,000 for over three years – helps protect a promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact translational research.

“Injuries are the leading cause of death for young Canadians. Early stabilization and timely transport to a specialized trauma centre gives patients the best chance for survival. Support from the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship will allow me to study how we can improve our current approach to prehospital trauma care in Ontario.

Through this fellowship we will look at the creation and implementation of a Prehospital Code Blood to reduce the time to blood transfusion, explore limitations of our current trauma triage protocols, and update prehospital trauma practices to ensure they are following the most recent evidence.” – Dr. Brodie Nolan

Dr. Brodie Nolan Awarded: 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

PSI Foundation is delighted to announce Dr. Brodie Nolan of St. Michael’s Hospital, Unity Health Toronto as the 2022 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellow.

Through this Fellowship, Dr. Nolan aims to deliver a much-needed reform to prehospital trauma care in Ontario.

Injuries are the leading cause of death for young Canadians. Annually in Ontario, injuries result in the death of nearly 6,000 people, over 75,000 hospitalizations and almost 6 billion dollars in direct health care costs. The role of prehospital care in a trauma system is to facilitate prompt transport to a trauma centre and initiate stabilization of the patient. These are complex tasks performed by paramedics in austere environments with incomplete information and minimal therapies available. The current approach to trauma care in Ontario is outdated and worse, there is evidence that some trauma practices are leading to patient harm.

About Dr. Brodie Nolan

Dr. Nolan is an emergency physician and trauma team leader at St. Michael’s Hospital, Unity Health Toronto and a transport medicine physician for Ornge, Ontario’s air ambulance and critical care transport service. He is an Assistant Professor and clinician scientist in the Department of Medicine at the University of Toronto and a scientist at the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute.

Dr. Nolan completed his medical school and emergency medicine residency training at the University of Toronto. He completed his MSc in Clinical Epidemiology and Health Care Research through the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto. Dr. Nolan’s research interests are in trauma, prehospital care, and patient safety. His work focuses on improving timely access to trauma care for injured patients in Ontario and the role of the provincial air ambulance system.

About the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

Knowledge translation research aims at transitioning research discoveries to the real world to improve health outcomes. This prestigious fellowship – valued at $300,000 for over three years – helps protect a promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact translational research.

“Many adverse events in hospital are underrecognized and poorly captured by existing data – You can’t improve what you can’t measure. Support from the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship will allow me to study whether artificial intelligence methods applied to routinely collected hospital data enhance our ability to detect adverse events.

As a starting point, we are focusing on hospital-acquired delirium, a feared complication of hospitalization that increases mortality rates and leaves many patients with long-term functional and cognitive impairment. Delirium likely affects about 20% of hospitalized medical patients but current data misses about 4/5 cases. We are applying artificial intelligence methods to hospital data from the GEMINI platform to see if we can improve the identification of delirium.” – Dr. Fahad Razak

2021 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

PSI Foundation is delighted to announce Dr. Fahad Razak of St. Michael’s Hospital of Unity Health Toronto/University of Toronto as the 2021 PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellow.

About Dr. Fahad Razak (University of Toronto/St. Michael’s Hospital of Unity Health Toronto)

Dr. Razak co-leads Ontario Health’s General Medicine Quality Improvement Network (GeMQIN), which focuses on improving the care of hospitalized medical patients. He is the co-founder and co-lead of GEMINI, a big data network across more than 30 large Ontario Hospitals that extracts data generated as part of routine medical care and uses this data for research and quality improvement (https://www.geminimedicine.ca/). GEMINI is the largest hospital data research network in Canada. The team is deeply committed to harnessing the potential of existing data to inform the work of front-line physicians and hospital leadership. Knowledge translation is at the heart of GEMINI’s mission.

Dr. Razak completed an engineering degree, medical school, and internal medicine training at the University of Toronto. His research training was an MSc in Health Research Methods from McMaster University, and the David E Bell Fellowship at Harvard University where he focused on developing methods to understand variability in health measures. He is a staff general internist at St Michael’s Hospital of Unity Health Toronto and an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Medicine and at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, University of Toronto. He is the inaugural Provincial Lead, Quality Improvement in General Internal Medicine for Ontario Health.

About PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship

Knowledge translation research aims at transitioning research discoveries to the real world to improve health outcomes.

This prestigious fellowship – valued at $300,000 for over three years – helps protect a new, promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact translational research.

“There is a large gap between how end-of-life care is currently delivered and how it could be optimally delivered. This award will allow my team to use big data to improve care for the dying. This includes building and implementing prognostic tools to identify who and when individuals should be receiving palliative care. Improving the timely reach of palliative and end-of-life care will reduce unnecessary aggressive care while increasing the quality of remaining life” – Dr. Peter Tanuseputro

Dr. Peter Tanuseputro’s Current Appointments:

• Assistant Professor, Division of Palliative Care, Department of Medicine, University of Ottawa
• Investigator, Bruyère Research Institute
• Scientist, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
• Adjunct Scientist, ICES

Dr. Peter Tanuseputro’s Research:

• Dr. Peter Tanuseputro’s current research program focuses on using linked health databases to develop population perspectives on health care use and outcomes associated with aging and end of life in Ontario
• This includes building predictive tools to provide individualized information that can be used to improve care and outcomes

About the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship:

PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship provides $300,000 over two or three years and helps protect a new, promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact knowledge translation research.

“Despite the high prevalence of sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) and the high use of opioid therapy, there are no large-scale population studies that have investigated whether opioid use and pre-existing SDB may interact synergistically to increase the risk of adverse health consequences. There is also an urgent need for both greater awareness of the sleep and respiratory effects of chronic opioid use and associated risks in individuals with SDB and a proactive approach to healthcare provider discussion about sleep disorders in individuals on opioids. This award will allow our team to improve the understanding of the relationship between opioid use and SDB, and the long-term consequences of their interaction. Further, findings from this study would inform clinical decision-making and may influence the future prescription of opioids to patients in Canada with SDB. This study may also provide data on modifiable risk factors associated with adverse long-term outcomes in this population. With this knowledge, we can develop interventions and strategies to develop effective patient-driven care.” – Dr. Tetyana Kendzerska

Dr. Tetyana Kendzerska’s Current Appointments:

• Assistant Professor, Department of Medicine, University of Ottawa
• Clinician Investigator, Department of Medicine, Division of Respirology, The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute / University of Ottawa
• Sleep Physician, The Ottawa Hospital
• Associate Scientist, The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
• Adjunct Scientist, ICES (formerly the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences)

Dr. Tetyana Kendzerska’s Research:

• Dr. Kendzerska’s current research program focuses on establishing a research platform, Ontario Sleep Data Holding, which will represent population-based real-world data collected from individuals with sleep-related problems. This platform will be built using multiple sources and will be used to translate evidence into quality medical care and health policy.
• As part of this broad-based initiative, she interested in investigating the relationship between opioid use and sleep-disordered breathing (SDB) and in translating obtained evidence into quality medical care for this population.

About the PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship:

PSI Graham Farquharson Knowledge Translation Fellowship provides $300,000 over two or three years and helps protect a new, promising clinician’s research time, allowing the Fellow to undertake high-impact knowledge translation research.