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The Digital Patient, which tells the stories of leaders in Digital Health, is excited to showcase the accomplishments of 15 surgical services leaders paving the way in healthcare innovation.

These 15 healthcare leaders are being recognized for having demonstrated significant accomplishment and innovation in leveraging Digital Health to improve the patient experience, clinical outcomes, and operational metrics for patients undergoing surgery. 

Moreover, these visionary leaders stand out for their achievements in orchestrating interdisciplinary teams to seamlessly integrate innovation into the clinical workflow. These initiatives typically involve providing patients with an app-based virtual companion to guide them from pre-surgical preparation through post-surgical recovery – via multimedia education, reminders, remote symptom monitoring, and more.

Please join us in celebrating these amazing leaders:

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Roch Baronette, Administrative Director, Surgical Services (Health Sciences North Sudbury). Mr. Baronette and the HSN Sudbury team rolled out surgical remote monitoring to over a dozen clinical areas, including orthopedics, women's health, cardiac, bariatrics and oncology. This initiative has supported over 6,000 patients with impressive improvements in lowering readmissions and ED visits. Mr. Baronette’s team has also used the technology to successfully scale up the same-day joint replacement surgery program as remote monitoring gives patients and providers confidence for an earlier discharge home.

Lisa Buttazzoni, Program Director of Critical Care and Surgical Services (Grand River Hospital): Ms. Buttazzoni launched a surgical remote monitoring program for patients in the Waterloo and Guelph Wellington region having orthopedic and colorectal surgery. “In just seven months, we’ve been able to reduce readmissions, length of stay, and ER visits as well as receive an overwhelming positive response from our patients and staff,” shared Ms. Buttazzoni. “The implementation of the technology supports our digital health mission by supercharging our ability to stay connected with our patients, regardless of where they live.” Her team’s tremendous effort shows in the results: ↓ 10-29% length of stay, ↓ 26-89% readmissions and ↓ 43-62% ED visits among orthopedic surgery patients.

Noreen Chan, Director of Community Collaboration and Diagnostics (Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare): Ms. Chan and her team at MAHC launched a digital patient engagement initiative to virtually guide patients across colorectal, c-section, gynecology, breast cancer and general surgery. The team has achieved tremendous patient activation and engagement rates (92% and 88% respectively).

Jane de Lacy, Vice President, Clinical Services (William Osler Health System): Ms. de Lacy led WOHS’ system wide rollout of a digital companion that helps all patients undergoing surgery from preparation through recovery at home. WOHS has also paved the way for increased accessibility by making their digital platform available in multiple languages, including English, Punjabi, Urdu, Hindi, Portuguese, Italian and French.

Janine Doucet, Administrative Director (Horizon Health Network’s New Brunswick Heart Center): Ms. Doucet and the New Brunswick Heart Center team launched a digital care journey platform that provides “vital digital health care support to patients preparing for or recovering from cardiac surgery at the New Brunswick Heart Centre – the province’s only tertiary cardiac care centre — at Horizon’s Saint John Regional Hospital.” 97% of patients report recommending the program to others. The initiative has achieved meaningful improvements on reducing hospital length of stay and ED visits, and is already expanding to support hip, knee and colon surgery patients in the province.

Caroline Fanti, Director of Surgical Services (Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre): Ms. Fanti is the driving force behind TBRHSC becoming the first hospital in Northwestern Ontario to launch a surgical remote monitoring program. The program has been highly successful, having scaled to over a dozen surgical programs and achieving a 90% patient activation rate, 48% reduction in hospital length of stay and 32% reduction in ED visits.

Paula Gilmore, Director, Rehabilitative and Palliative Care (Bluewater Health): Ms. Gilmore championed bringing digital care journeys to guide and remotely monitor patients undergoing orthopedic surgery in the town of Sarnia. Since launching their initiative, more than 1,000+ patients have benefited, with a stunning 93% patient activation rate and 95% satisfaction rate.

Karen Guzzo, Director of Clinical Operations (Sault Area Hospital): Ms. Guzzo was a key driver of SAH’s enterprise deployment of surgical remote care monitoring across general surgery, orthopedics and women’s health. The SAH team was not only the first hospital in Canada to deliver a MEDITECH-integrated surgical remote monitoring program, but they achieved fantastic patient outcomes, including reducing ED visits by 72% and readmissions by 64%.

Jane Harwood, Director of Surgery (Toronto East Health Network): Ms. Harwood has been a catalyst for TEHN’s digital care journey initiative that has helped over 6,500 patients across all of surgical services. In 2020, Ms. Harwood’s team was one of the first hospitals in Canada to digitally screen patients for COVID-19 symptoms leading up to surgery. 

Josee Jean, Director of Clinical Services (Timmins & District Hospital): Ms. Jean has played a pivotal role in the growth of TADH’s digital patient engagement rollout, which now supports patients across thirteen clinical areas such as orthopedics, breast cancer, colorectal, hernia, women's health, urology and endocrine surgery. Most recently, TADH became the first hospital in Canada to digitally guide patients having cataract surgery.

Erin Landry, Director, Surgical Services (Oak Valley Health): In less than a year, Ms. Landry and Oak Valley Health have supported more than 1,000 patients having hip, knee, shoulder or spine surgery in just the first seven months of launching their digital patient engagement program. Ms. Landry shared: “We are very pleased to see that 81% of patients reported that the tool helped them feel more confident at home after surgery and 22% of patients said it helped them avoid some visits to the hospital.” Ms. Landry’s team is also using the platform to improve patient-reported outcome measurement (PROM) survey response rates and to monitor antibiotic and opioid use - thereby supporting quality improvement initiatives. .

Lucy Pereira, Manager, (Sunnybrook Holland Orthopaedic & Arthritic Centre): In 2015, Ms. Pereira and the Holland Centre launched the first digital care journey initiative for Orthopedic Surgery in Canada. These pioneers have digitally guided over 7,500 patients and have presented or published their experience leveraging digital health for improved patient self-management a number of times.

Puneet Sandhu, Director of Surgical, Maternal, and Paediatric Programs (Southlake Regional Health Centre). Since launching its digital care journey program for knee surgery, Ms. Sandhu’s team at SRHC has achieved phenomenal results, boasting a 90% patient activation rate and achieving meaningful reductions in length of stay, readmissions and ED visits.

Jaelynne Sonke, Director Of Patient Services (Niagara Health): Ms. Sonke is a key leader in Niagara Health’s launch of a robust digital care journey initiative digitally guiding patients pre and post-surgery across three hospital locations for orthopedics, urology, general surgery, and vascular surgery. Ms. Sonke’s team did a novel digital front door integration with its regional Niagara Navigator app.

‍Chantal Voyer, Director of Surgical Services (North Bay Regional Health Centre): Ms. Voyer leads a highly successful surgical remote monitoring program at NBRHC, delivering digital guidance to patients across orthopedics, urology, breast cancer, hysterectomy, c-section and colorectal surgery. Over 1,000 patients have benefited so far, and Ms. Voyer’s team recently announced incredible results of ↓78% readmissions, ↓54% ER visits and ↓50% hospital length of stay - with 95% of patients recommending the program.