Mechanical Ventilation Symposium 2017
 

FACULTY

Laurent Brochard
Laurent Brochard has been recently appointed as the new Interdepartmental Division Director for Critical Care in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto. He is Full Professor, Clinician scientist in the Division of Critical Care Saint Michael’s Hospital in Toronto. He was previously working in Geneva as Head of the Intensive Care Unit of the Geneva University Hospital, in Switzerland for three years. Most of his career took place at Henri Mondor Hospital, Assistance Publique – Hôpitaux de Paris, and at Paris EST University, France. He has a strong involvement in research, and especially clinical research about mechanical ventilation. He has been Editor-in-Chief of the journal Intensive Care Medicine from 2001 to 2007, and is currently serving as Deputy Editor for the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. He is leading a European Research Network dedicated to clinical studies in Mechanical Ventilation, called REVA.
 
Lu Chen
Lu Chen completed his Critical Care Medicine training and worked as a physician in Beijing Tiantan Hospital after graduating from Xiangya Medical School (Hunan, China). He worked as a research assistant with Dr. Marco Ranieri in Molinette hospital (Turin, Italy) for one year in 2010. He currently works at St Michael’s Hospital (Toronto, Canada) as a research fellow supervised by Dr. Laurent Brochard, focusing on respiratory mechanics and ARDS.
 
Lorenzo Del Sorbo
Lorenzo Del Sorbo is an intensive Care attending at Toronto General Hospital, since appointment in 2014. He trained in Internal Medicine at the University of Torino (1997-2003), and in adult Critical Care Medicine at the University of Toronto (2004-2007). He was appointed and worked as an Assistant Professor of Intensive Care Medicine at the University of Torino, Italy, since 2007. Lorenzo's main academic interests focus on the application of innovative strategies to prevent the injury induced by invasive mechanical ventilation. These include investigations on extra-corporeal life support strategies in patients with ARDS and COPD exacerbation, on non-invasive ventilation. His work also extends into the translational research defining the mechanisms of organ injury and developing novel therapeutic approaches in cell and animal models of critical illness.
 
Eddy Fan
Dr. Fan is an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Interdepartmental Division of Critical Care Medicine at the University of Toronto in Toronto, Canada. From a clinical perspective, he is an attending physician in the intensive care unit at the University Health Network and Mount Sinai Hospital and is the Medical Director of the Extracorporeal Life Support program at the Toronto General Hospital. Dr. Fan received his MD degree from the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada, and completed both his residency in internal medicine and his fellowship in critical care medicine at the University of Toronto. He obtained his PhD in Clinical Investigation from the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. His current research interests are focused on advanced life support for acute respiratory failure and patient outcomes from critical illness. These include investigations on the epidemiology and use of mechanical ventilation and extracorporeal life support in patients with ARDS, as well as on the development of ICU-acquired weakness, early rehabilitation in ICU patients, and long-term outcomes in survivors of critical illness.
 
Niall Ferguson
Dr. Niall Ferguson is Head of Critical Care Medicine at the University Health Network and Mount Sinai Hospital, and Associate Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Physiology, and the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto. He is a Senior Scientist in the Toronto General Research Institute, and the Critical Care Lead for the Toronto-Central Local Health Integration Network. Dr. Ferguson’s research, which is supported by local, provincial, and national granting agencies, focuses on: (1) mechanical ventilation (epidemiology; weaning and liberation; extubation and tracheostomy); (2) acute respiratory distress syndrome (definitions; ventilatory management; trial design); and (3) novel modes of mechanical ventilation, including extra-corporeal life support. Dr. Ferguson is the Scientific Programme Chair for Critical Care Canada Forum, Canada’s premier critical care conference. He is a frequent invited-speaker at national and international meetings, having given over 250 such talks.
 
0Ian Fraser
Respirologist & Director
Provincial Centre of Weaning Excellence
Dr. Fraser is a respirologist and director of the Provincial Centre of Weaning Excellence, which is based at the Toronto East General Hospital. He has led clinical and research initiatives in quality of care improvement and inter-professional care. He has also been involved in the development of a Canadian community of excellence in prolonged ventilation at a regional, provincial and national level.
 
Alberto Goffi
Alberto Goffi, MD, is a Staff Physician at Toronto Western Hospital – University Health Network, He was recently appointed Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto, Department of Medicine and Interdepartmental Division of Critical Care Medicine. His clinical and academic interests include neurocritical care and point-of-care ultrasound in acute care medicine, with a particular focus on the clinical utility of ultrasound in critical care medicine and optimal teaching strategies for its competency achievement.
 
Ewan Goligher
Dr. Goligher is an intensivist at the Toronto Western Hospital. He obtained his MD from the University of British Columbia and trained in internal medicine and critical care medicine at the University of Toronto. He is currently pursuing graduate studies in the Department of Physiology at the University of Toronto. His research program focuses broadly on the clinical impact of physiological interactions between the respiratory muscles, the acutely injured lung, and the mechanical ventilator. In particular, he is actively investigating the mechanisms and outcomes of ventilator-associated diaphragm dysfunction in human subjects.
 
John Granton
John Granton is a professor of Medicine at the University of Toronto and head of Respirology at University Health Network, Mount Sinai Hospital and Women’s College Hospital. He is a consultant in respirology, lung transplantation and critical care at the Toronto General Hospital. He established and remains the director of the pulmonary hypertension (PH) program at the University Health Network. He is chair of the board of the Ontario Lung Association and chair of the national fundraising advisory committee for the Canadian Lung Association. His research interests are in pulmonary hypertension, exercise physiology, and critical illness.
 
Margaret Herridge
Margaret S. Herridge MSc MD FRCPC MPH is a Professor of Medicine, Critical Care and Respiratory Medicine at the Toronto General Hospital/University Health Network, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada. Her research interests include 5-year outcomes after the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), 1-year outcomes after the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and long-stay, ventilated critically ill patients and their family caregivers. She is currently Co-PI on a multi-centre CIHR funded study Towards RECOVER which began in 2007. This program of research is evaluating patient and caregiver outcomes to 2 years after prolonged mechanical ventilation and is the first phase of a program that will develop future family-based rehabilitation interventions after critical illness. She completed her epidemiology training at the Channing Laboratory/Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massaschusetts and has a Master of Public Health from the Harvard School of Public Health.
 
Brian Kavanagh
Dr. Brian Kavanagh graduated from University College Dublin (Ireland) in 1985. Following residency in Internal Medicine in Dublin and in Anaesthesia (residency and fellowship) in Toronto, he trained in Critical Care Medicine in Stanford. He returned to the Toronto General Hospital in 1994 and in 1999 moved to the Hospital for Sick Children where he is a clinician-scientist and holds the Dr. Geoffrey Barker Chair in Critical Care Medicine. He is a professor of anesthesia, medicine and physiology, and in 2006 was appointed chair of the Department of Anesthesia at the University of Toronto. He chairs the executive committee for the Critical Care Canada-Forum and is past program chair for the critical care assembly at the American Thoracic Society. Dr. Kavanagh is the physician lead for the Organ Donation Program and chairs the Organ & Tissue Donation committee at the Hospital for Sick Children.  
 
John Laffey
St. Michael's Hospital
John Laffey is Anesthetist in Chief at St Michael’s Hospital and Professor in the Departments of Anesthesia and Physiology at the University of Toronto. His research is focused on ARDS, particularly the mechanisms underlying ventilation induced lung injury. He has a longstanding interest in the effects and mechanisms of hypercapnic acidosis in ARDS and sepsis. His current research focus is the investigation of the therapeutic potential of cell therapies for ARDS.
 
Matias Madorno
Buenos Aires Institute of Technology
Matías Madorno completed his degree in Informatics Engineering and postgraduate degree in Design of Medical Devices at the Buenos Aires Institute of Technology in Argentina. He is an Associate Professor in Engineering and PhD student at the same institution. With more than 15 years of experience in design and development of medical devices, his main research interest is focused on developing tools for bedside monitoring of respiratory physiology including respiratory mechanics, inspiratory effort, and control of breathing. He received 5 grants from the Argentinian Ministry of Science and Technology for innovative research and development. He is currently the manager of a company that develops medical devices including a monitor of respiratory mechanics.
 
Sangeeta Mehta
MD from McGill University, Internal Medicine Residency at University of Toronto, Pulmonary and Critical Care, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. Respirologist and Critical Care Physician, Mount Sinai Hospital. Associate Professor, University of Toronto. Research Director, Medical Surgical ICU, Mount Sinai Hospital. Research Interests: ICU sedation, Psychological morbidity following ICU discharge, ICU delirium, Ischemia and troponin in patients with septic shock, High Frequency Oscillation.
 
Thomas Piraino
Clinical Educator for Respiratory Therapy Services
St. Joseph's Healthcare
Thomas Piraino is the Clinical Specialist – Mechanical Ventilation for St. Michael's Hospital Centre of Excellence in Mechanical Ventilation (CoEMV) and a Lecturer (Adjunct) for the Department of Anesthesia, Division of Critical Care at McMaster University. He has spoken internationally at various Respiratory and Critical Care Conferences, he is a published researcher and author on the subject of invasive and noninvasive mechanical ventilation, and monitoring in the critical care environment. He is also a member of the Editorial Board of the Respiratory Care Journal, and the Canadian Journal of Respiratory Therapy.
 
Dr. Gordon Rubenfeld
Professor of Medicine
University of Toronto
Dr. Rubenfeld is Professor of Medicine in the Interdepartmental Division of Critical Care Medicine at the University of Toronto and Chief of the Program in Trauma, Emergency, and Critical Care at Sunnybrook Health Science Center. He has published over 100 peer reviewed articles related to organization and structure of critical care, epidemiology of acute lung injury, and improving end of life care in the ICU.
 
Damon Scales
Dr. Scales obtained his MD from the University of Toronto (UofT,1997). He then completed residencies in Internal Medicine and Critical Care Medicine (CCM) and a PhD in Clinical Epidemiology. He is an Associate Professor of Medicine (UofT) and an Intensivist at Sunnybrook HSC. He is also the Program Director of the UofT Adult CCM Residency program. His research evaluates interventions and system-factors that influence outcomes of critically ill patients; he has conducted several large quality improvement RCTs. Dr. Scales is a member of several international committees, including the organizing committee of the Critical Care Canada Forum.
 
Christer Sinderby
Christer Sinderby is a physiologist who took his MSc at Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, and PhD degree at University of Gothenburg in the late 80’s. He trained as a postdoctoral fellow for half a decade at the Meakins Christie laboratories, McGill University in the early 90’s and the became independent researcher at University of Montreal. In 2003, Christer took the position as Staff Scientist in the critical care department at St Michael’s Hospital, University of Toronto. Major achievements in the career would include standardized technology for measuring diaphragm electrical activity, which 1) has been used to dissociate between neural and mechanical efforts in respiratory muscle failure and 2) led up to the invention of technology for Neurally Adjusted Ventilatory Assist in humans. Technology that is now clinically used world wide. Current research interest are: 1) neural control of mechanical ventilation, 2) patient-ventilator interaction 3) control of breathing during mechanical ventilation, especially during acute lung injury/ acute respiratory distress syndrome.
 
Jeffrey Singh
Jeffrey Mahan Singh completed his medical training at the University of Toronto in 1999 followed by residencies in Internal Medicine and Critical Care Medicine. He received his US Neurocritical Care Certification in 2008. He is currently Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Toronto and is Site Director of the Medical-Surgical and Neuro-Intensive Care Unit at the Toronto Western Hospital. His research interests include mechanical ventilation in acute brain and spinal cord injuries, and he is the co-Principal Investigator of an ONF-RHI funded study to evaluate the use of NAVA ventilation in acute cervical spinal cord injury. He is also actively leading several quality improvement initiatives targeting various aspects of the provision of critical care to patients with acute neurological injuries.
 
Takeshi Yoshida
Dr. Yoshida is a graduate from Mie University School of Medicine in Japan. He completed his clinical training in Osaka and is board certified in Emergency Medicine and Critical Care Medicine. His graduate training (PhD) was completed in Osaka and focused on mechanisms of lung injury; during this time he demonstrated that lung injury can result from spontaneous effort during mechanical ventilation. Following this he completed a postdoctoral fellowship in São Paulo (Dr. Amato) where he described ‘Pendelluft’, a new mechanism of spontaneous breathing-associated lung injury. He is currently completing an additional 2-year post-doctoral fellowship in Toronto (Dr. Kavanagh) focusing on negative abdominal pressure, spontaneous breathing, and ARDS. Dr. Yoshida is supported by a RestraComp training award from the Hospital for Sick Children; he has published 35 papers and received multiple awards.