Dr. Justin Di Donato, Family Physician, North West Toronto FHG, Woodbridge - Dr. Di Donato is a digital health pioneer. He was the first physician to adopt EMR-integrated Digital Health Drug Repository (DHDR) that gives him seamless real-time access through his certified EMR to dispensed drugs covered under the Ontario Drug Benefits (ODB) program, dispensed narcotics recorded in the provincial Narcotics Management System (NMS) and COVID-19 vaccination data. He was also the first physician to adopt eForms through his EMR. His efforts have provided OMD with valuable lessons to inform a wider rollout of these two initiatives to clinicians across Ontario.

Dr. Farnaz Ghorbani, Family Physician, York Medical FHG, Richmond Hill - Dr. Ghorbani has leveraged OMD i4C Advisory Service and Dashboard to improve her practice and achieve her quality improvement (QI) goals. She has shared her proficiency in primary care quality improvement (QI) and has become a champion in supporting her fellow family physicians with their QI initiatives. Dr. Ghorbani is a strong proponent of the i4C Advisory Service and Dashboard and volunteered to share her experience as a speaker at the OMD Educates: Digital Health & Virtual Care Day conference.

Samantha Gupta, Quality Improvement Decision Support Specialist, Central Brampton FHT, Brampton - Samantha Gupta has done exceptional work leading all steps of the implementation of the Ocean tool at two locations of the Central Brampton Family Health Team. The implementation included integration with our OMD-certified EMR. This project greatly helped to improve the patient experience (e.g., by communicating important messages and resources to patients faster electronically), while streamlining the process for internal teams to distribute and gather information more efficiently (e.g., COVID-19 pre-screening questionnaire sent automatically with every booking via our EMR). Samantha also trains and supports staff to use the tool.

Dr. Ilana Halperin, Clinic Director, Diabetes in Pregnancy Clinic, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto - In December 2020, Dr. Halperin was appointed Physician Lead for Digital and Virtual Health at Sunnybrook. Her experience and expertise with virtual care greatly helped to simplify the transition to virtual care during COVID-19 for Sunnybrook's Diabetes in Pregnancy Clinic. Under Dr. Halperin's leadership, the whole process from the gestational diabetes education class, remote monitoring of glucose values, physician and dietitian review, insulin initiation and titration, and postpartum follow-up care was provided virtually using tools integrated with our certified EMR. Patients rated rate their virtual care experience as good or excellent (93%) with a preference to continue virtual visits in the future (84%). Dr. Halperin is a regular speaker at conferences and events on virtual care and diabetes technology, and has also presented to Parliament. 

Dr. Dina Kulik, Founder and Director, Kidcrew Paediatrics, Toronto - Dr. Kulik is a virtual care pioneer and role model. She is the founder of Kidcrew, a paediatric clinic in Toronto that provides comprehensive primary, consulting and after-hours paediatric care. Dr. Kulik directs the clinic of about 40 physicians, allied health care professionals and their support staff, which uses a certified EMR to manage patient information. The clinic has provided care for over 50,000 patients all over Ontario. Since COVID-19, many offices had closed their doors to in-person contact making it challenging for some patients to access regular services. Under her leadership, Dr. Kulik and her team provide excellent care using digital health tools. 

Dr. James Lane, IT Physician Lead, Georgian Bay FHO, Stayner - Dr. Lane has been instrumental in leading the Georgian Bay FHO and the South Georgian Bay area towards remarkable integration of their digital infrastructure. He led the merging of EMR databases in 2009 to create an opportunity to pilot ePrescribing, subsequently helping to leverage this platform to integrate providers across multiple organizations within the region.  Today, local physicians and allied health professionals have EMR access, and through our Ontario Health Team, we are expanding our reach to other health and community organizations in the region.

Dr. Marco Lo, Digital Co-Lead, East Toronto Family Practice Network, Toronto - Dr. Lo has been instrumental in the design and implementation of the East Toronto Family Practice Network Ontario Health Team digital strategy. He has provided primary care leadership for several key successful IT innovation priorities, including the expansion of the Michael Garron Hospital Hypercare communication platform enabling rapid communication between family practitioners and hospital-based specialists to improve patient care, and the implementation of the Ocean eReferral platform integrated with a certified EMR. He is also helping to facilitate primary care uptake of digital tools.

Dr. Meghan Davis – Dr. Davis is a family physician in Hamilton. She is also the Regional Primary Care Lead for LHIN 4 and the Medical Lead, Screen for Life Coach for Ontario Health-Cancer Care Ontario. Dr. Davis endeavours to improve screening rates throughout the region and for under-screened populations. She worked with OMD and other organizations to develop EMR-specific cancer screening guides to support primary care clinicians to use their EMRs for cancer screening. She advances improved cancer screening rates and cancer care education through social, broadcast and print media, blogging and connecting primary care clinicians with OMD's advisory services.