Pulse: The Ottawa Hospital Foundation Podcast

Frankie Nadeau is a senior occupational therapist at The Ottawa Hospital Rehabilitation Centre. She's dedicated more than two decades to caring for patients, combining her knowledge and humour. In this conversation, she talks about the pivotal role of an occupational therapist at the Rehab Centre and the special bond her team creates with patients, including the "TSN turning point" in Sean Sisk's...

Jill Barr is a young professional who has stepped forward to help lead the next generation of philanthropy. As a childhood cancer survivor, Jill has a unique perspective on the importance of having state-of-the-art healthcare. She has raised her hand to support the Campaign to Create Tomorrow and engage others to do the same.  Listen to learn about Jill's first introduction to The Ottawa Hospital...

It's not just the stuff you see in science fiction movies anymore. VR technology is changing the way complex surgeries are planned. Picture a virtual reality system taking hundreds of medical images and giving a surgeon a 3D view that allows them to move within the patient's body — just like a video game — before surgery. It's a whole new way of surgical planning and this new VR program was used f...

The Ottawa Hospital's mental health team  provides early diagnosis and treatment of severe mental illness to patients across Eastern Ontario. In this episode, we speak with Dr. Sarah Brandigampola , a psychiatrist at our hospital who works in the On Track: First Episode Psychosis Program . She discusses the three-year program that cares for patients diagnosed with schizophrenia, the multi-discipli...

When Heba Haidar was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, her world came to a grinding halt. She was on maternity leave, with three young children under the age of five, and she worried about what the future might hold for her and her family. Hear Heba's story – one of our latest in the cancer journey series — and find out why cancer is not such a big scary word anymore.(26:34)

As a young boy, Dr. Alvin Tieu likely saw himself becoming a professional athlete because of his love of sports. But there was a shift in grade 7 — science became more interesting, and he decided to write an essay on the Big Bang theory. From there, his interest in medicine and research started to grow. Today, Dr. Tieu is an emerging leader at The Ottawa Hospital and the  2023 recipient of the Wor...

Registered Nurse Phil Nguyen exudes energy — whether he's caring for patients on 5W in the Transplant and Cellular Therapy Unit at the General Campus, teaching the next generation of healthcare workers at uOttawa, or busting a move as a hip-hop dancer.  In this conversation, Phil talks about why he considers The Ottawa Hospital his home away from home. He reveals what he loves most about his job,...

Dr. Shawn Aaron's path to research wasn't planned. In fact, his goal was to become a physician and care for patients with lung disease, but that all changed when he came to The Ottawa Hospital and fell in love with research. In this conversation, Dr. Aaron discusses his practice-changing research for cystic fibrosis and COPD. While he admits his research career saw early success when he turned his...

Faced with an autoimmune disorder since childhood, rock radio announcer Amy Volume has been a patient of The Ottawa Hospital for about 20 years. More recently, she started losing mobility in one leg and that's when her orthopaedic team said it was time for her to have hip replacement surgery. Listen to hear more about Amy's story and why she considers our ortho surgeons the real rock stars. (23:46...

Meet Dr. Barbara Vanderhyden – a s enior scientist at The Ottawa Hospital who's held the inaugural Corinne Boyer Chair in Ovarian Cancer Research since 2000.  In this episode, Dr. Vanderhyden talks about why she's devoted her career to investigating ovarian cancer. You'll learn about her dedicated team, and find out who are the unofficial members, and the important role they play. Plus, Dr. Vander...

After nearly a decade of mini seizures, Stefanie Scrivens was diagnosed with a rare form of a brain tumour at only 20 years old — that was in 2009. She would be one of the first to benefit from a new treatment option to increase her chance of survival, including two complex, 8-hour awake brain surgeries at The Ottawa Hospital to remove the tumour. Today, at the age of 34, we check in with Stefanie...

Dr. Paul MacPherson is a longtime advocate for gay men's health. In 2023, he was named the first Clinical Research Chair in Gay Men's Health at The Ottawa Hospital and the University of Ottawa. This chair is a first of its kind in any Canadian hospital. In this episode, Dr. MacPherson talks about what it means to see this research become a reality, the stigma gay men face when it comes to their he...

UPDATE : Sadly, Alison passed away on Wednesday, October 11, 2023. We offer our deepest condolences to all those who loved her and we remain profoundly inspired by her.  Alison Hughes was first diagnosed with breast cancer at age 37. At the time, she was running her own business and the mother of two young children. The news was the shock of her life. Ten years later, her world was turned upside d...

Dr. Dar Dowlatshahi is a stroke neurologist and senior scientist at our hospital. He is leading the Canadian site of a global research trial that could change how we treat the deadliest and least treatable form of stroke. In this episode, we go behind the scenes with the region's stroke team to learn more about The Ottawa Hospital's leading role in this study that could be a gamechanger for bleedi...

Before Julia Wagg passed away in 2017 at age 36, she decided to leave a gift in her will to support cancer research. She was inspired by a young 'spitfire' doctor and researcher who cared for her at The Ottawa Hospital.  In this episode, Holly Wagg shares the story of her widow's journey with leukemia, as well as Julia's decision to leave a legacy gift to The Ottawa Hospital to help future patient...

When Jackie Holzman, the former mayor of Ottawa, was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1998, she went public with her story hoping to encourage people to get a mammogram and to further advance research at The Ottawa Hospital. Now, the former board member of our research institute is standing alongside her granddaughter, Rebecca Leikin, who is undergoing breast cancer care. Rebecca now hopes to help...

Dr. Jacinthe Lampron is a trauma surgeon and the medical director of The Ottawa Hospital's Trauma Program. She's also a reserve medical officer in the Canadian Armed Forces, where she served in Afghanistan. Dr. Lampron shares with us her wartime experience and what led her to our hospital. She explains how our integrated trauma team comes together each time a critically ill patient arrive s at the...

The Ottawa Hospital's new state-of-the-art campus will be the most patient-centred and technologically advanced research hospital in the country. Simply put, it will revolutionize how we deliver healthcare. In this episode, Jason-Emery Groën, the Vice-President, Design Director at HDR — an architecture and engineering firm working on the project — takes you behind the scenes to learn what patients...

Sepsis   accounts for almost 20% of global deaths   annually, and the search for answers has been decades in the making. However,   The Ottawa Hospital is taking a big step forward in the next phase of  a world-first clinical trial using stem cells  in patients with septic shock. Early results are promising, and they could lead to innovative treatment options for millions of patients, worldwide. I...

Kathryn Tremblay is the CEO and co-founder of Canada's leading independent staffing firm – Altis Recruitment. In this episode, she discusses her billboard message "What's possible?" and how that's shaped her professionally and personally. She also dives into the role philanthropy plays in her life, including her family's connection to The Ottawa Hospital, and why today she supports the Campaign to...

Dr. Meshach Asare-Werehene is the Immuno-Oncology Program Lead in the Tsang Lab at The Ottawa Hospital, specializing in gynecological cancers. Since he was a young boy growing up in Ghana, he was curious and always asked questions.   In this episode, he describes the one simple question that sparked his interest in learning more about cancer, and you'll also find out how he got the nickname "headm...

After dedicating 27 years of her career to The Ottawa Hospital, Denise Picard-Stencer was shocked when she found herself back at the hospital in 2019 — this time as a patient. Denise shares her cancer journey after a multiple myeloma diagnosis and what it was like seeing care from the patient's perspective. She also talks about witnessing the impact of research. (24:58)

From a young age, Dr. Ronda Lun was fascinated by neuroscience and the brain — you could say it came naturally, as her father was a neurosurgeon. But today, Dr. Lun is carving out her own career path at The Ottawa Hospital, focusing on clinical care and research for stroke patients . Author of more than 34 papers to date, Dr. Lun received an honourable mention for the hospital's 2022 Worton Resear...

When Camille Leahy was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia at age 35, it was a devastating blow. Despite many rounds of chemotherapy and a stem cell transplant, her cancer kept returning. In this episode, she talks about the rollercoaster ride that led her to our hospital's Canadian-first CAR T-cell therapy clinical trial — where she finally found hope. Camille also shares how the experien...

The year 2022 was an important one at The Ottawa Hospital Foundation with the launch of the historic Campaign to Create Tomorrow . In this episode, Tim Kluke, President and CEO of The Ottawa Hospital Foundation, looks back at the momentous year. Listen to find out how he would best describe 2022, as well as: the donor stories that helped kick off the campaign. how the Foundation instills the confi...