“We want to develop an environment where everyone at Women’s College Hospital takes part in research, scholarly quality improvement and educational scholarship. An environment where Academics is embedded into all areas of the hospital, to produce real-time improvements to patient care, to advance health equity and to drive new health system solutions. To do that, we need to make the process straight forward, equitable and accessible,” said Dr. Rulan Parekh, vice president of Academics, Women’s College Hospital (WCH).
Since joining WCH in 2021 to lead the newly integrated Academics portfolio, comprised of the Research & Innovation Institute, the Learning Institute and the Learning Health System (LHS), Dr. Parekh and the Academics team have been hard at work to deliver on this vision. Let’s take a look at Academics and how it evolved over 2022-2023.
As WCH moves towards a Learning Health System model, the team has focused on addressing important foundational processes – with ongoing LHS-focused stakeholder engagement, as well as planning for the development of the LHS Collaboratory and related initiatives.
Last year’s key initiative, Project Launch, continues to be extensively developed with the support and guidance of a roster of stakeholders including clinical directors, department heads, service providers, operations team members, designated testers, as well as end-users. This multi-phased operations program features the Step 1: WCH Initiation Form (a planning tool) and Step 2: Service Providers’ Impact Process along with many new sections that have recently been soft launched.
“We use the soft launch period as a time to introduce new tools across the organization, explore their full functionality, collect feedback, and most importantly, address feedback to ensure that the newly developed tools meet the needs of WCH and anyone pursing a quality improvement, education, or research study/project,” explains Evelina Rutkowski, manager, Academic Operational Excellence.
Similarly, the Research Ethics Office (REO) has streamlined their processes and developed various templates and guidance documents to improve the overall review process and drive efficiencies. The new Epic Research functionality has been established to better support and bring awareness to research patients paired with monthly training sessions.
Building Teams and Expanding Equity
Throughout the year new team members were brought onboard to advance priorities within Academics. This includes the implementation of a Learning Health System with leadership from the new LHS manager, the community & patient engagement lead, as well as enhancing operations and scholarly quality improvement supports with our education specialist and the learner & student services manager. Building awareness of education research and innovation at WCH were highlighted through conference presentations, as well as networking and collaborating with stakeholders to develop a community of practice.
To further equity and representation, the Academics team has continued to advance the Emily Stowe Scholars Program (ESSP) . In total, 60 students participated in both ESSP and the WCH Summer Student Research Program (SSRP). These programs give students the opportunity to support scientists in their work, engage in panel and workshop events and present their work at the end of the program. WCH is establishing relationships that support, mentor and advance diverse young people in science and healthcare throughout their educational and career trajectories.
Research Excellence and Engagement
Science and innovation are critical to healthcare advancement. In April, the first Day of Excellence in Academics was held – a day celebrating and sharing WCH accomplishments in quality improvement, research, and education. The Day of Excellence integrated the Jim Ruderman Lecture on Leadership & Innovation, interprofessional poster presentations and an awards ceremony on the same day to celebrate all education, quality improvement and research conducted at WCH. In total, over 200 people attended, 27 posters were submitted, and 20 awards were provided.
Academics also focused on engaging with its community by highlighting the importance of diversity within the health science sector. On February 3rd,2023, Academics in collaboration with the Baycrest Health Sciences hosted a series of events to mark the International Day of Women and Girls in Science. The virtual panel event, Beyond the Binary: Challenging Sex and Gender Variables in Science, featured remarks by Dr. Cara Tannenbaum, and had over 230 attendees.
This past October, WCH partnered with the Gairdner Foundation to host Women of Gairdner, a panel event featuring Gairdner laureates Dr. Katalin Karikó and Dr. Deborah J. Cook. These renowned scientists shared insights into their unique career paths, their work and the challenges they have faced, as well as the need for greater equity within the health sciences. The event specifically aimed to inspire high school students from diverse backgrounds and underrepresented communities. To this end, 10 Toronto-based high schools selected intrepid STEM-focused students to attend the event. They were joined by youth from community organizations and mentorship programs, as well as undergraduate students.
The team continued to build on this success creating further opportunities for engagement, continuing to enhance Academic operations, and advancing equity within health research via an in-person strategic planning session with scientists and operational staff in January 2023 which complimented the work that took place in July 2022 with a 1-day in-person session with Rotman (University of Toronto). The fiscal year ended with a workshop hosted by Academics on “Building a Research Roadmap for Cultural Inclusion and Accountability”.
“Reflecting back, so much progress and hard work has taken place this past year”, Parekh shared. “I look forward to working with the team to continue this momentum throughout the 2023-2024 year.”
To learn more about WCH Academics, visit: womensacademics.ca