Our vision is to promote a safe and respectful work environment to enhance and optimize the experience of all department members so they feel valued and safe and are empowered to deliver world class patient care, research and education.
Aims
Create a culture of professionalism
- Engage all department members to create a culture that celebrates Professionalism
- Promote effective conflict resolution
- Improve communication with leadership (department, faculty, university, health authority) and all department members so everyone feels empowered and heard
Foster wellness
- Promote engagement, unity, and build stronger relationships among sites and and sections within Radiology and with other Departments
- Support and enhance the experience of all department members
- Survey to assess burnout of department members
- Survey to assess psychological health of department members
- Suggestion box to identify wellness issues from different standpoints (physician, academic faculty, staff, etc)
- Provide resources including workshops (eg: time management, work-life integration)
- Facility engagement to fund initiatives in areas of wellness for our group
- Develop a wellness team lead by physicians, for peer support and mentorship
- Buddy system for junior staff and faculty, mentorship for trainees (residents, graduate students, clinical fellows, post-doctoral fellows).
Promote and support workplace psychological safety
- Solidify inter and intra-department bonds
- Increase psychological safety in our workplace
- Work to enhance organizational clarity
Dr. Silvia Chang, Vice-Chair, Professionalism & Wellness
Dr. Chang is Associate Professor and Vice Chair of Professionalism and Wellness in the Department of Radiology at the University of British Columbia. She is also the Division Head of Abdominal Imaging in the Department of Radiology at Vancouver General Hospital and at UBC Hospital. Wellness continues to become an important growing issue affecting many institutions including our own UBC Radiology community. As Chair of the UBC Department of Radiology Wellness Committee, Dr. Chang is proud and grateful to work with such an enthusiastic and caring group of individuals. She looks forward to this opportunity to work with this Committee on wellness initiatives and promote a respectful workplace for all members of UBC Radiology Department. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her family, biking and travelling. Her favourite vacation spot so far is the Maldives. Fun fact: she is a certified scuba diver.
Dr. Joshua Burrill
I am an Interventional Radiologist at Royal Columbian Hospital. I trained in the UK and came to Vancouver 12 years ago for two fellowships, met my wife here, a child psychiatrist, and stayed. The challenges of a work-life balance are complicated by family, colleagues and the individual need to find the time to rest/reenergize/stay fit. I am interested in working with the group to look at the wellness challenges faced by both diagnostic and interventional radiologists to see what we can do to improve quality of work and therefore quality of life for our colleagues.
Dr. Sammy Chu
I am a radiologist at the BC Cancer Agency in Vancouver. Even before the pandemic, clinicians and scientists were facing substantial challenges. After two years of COVID, the pressures continue to mount, affecting all aspects of our lives–social, financial, and vocational. I would like to hear the problems that everyone is facing, and see if we can come up with ideas to help make work and learning just a little bit easier.
Dr. Brenda Farnquist
I am a practicing radiologist in Kelowna, have been here for 9 years. I am the current Medical Director for MI at KGH. Trained at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital with MSK and Women’s Imaging Fellowships. I am also on the EDI committee and president elect of the BCRS. I have a daughter, love to cycle and run, and have an interest in physician wellness.
Dr. Sharon Gershony
I have worked at BC Children’s Hospital since 2019 as a pediatric nuclear radiologist and prior to that I completed my MD, as well as my Radiology and Nuclear Medicine residency programs at UBC. At work, I am committed to improving nuclear radiology imaging in children and feel it is an honor and privilege to work at BC Children’s Hospital. I try to balance this with my very busy home life, which includes caring for my wonderful (and energetic!) 3 children aged 5 and under, and my two dogs. I believe that supporting wellness and professionalism in the workplace is crucial for both allied health care professionals as well as ensuring best patient care.
Dr. Urvi Joshi
Urvi is a nuclear medicine physician who practices at Royal Columbian and Burnaby Hospitals. She completed medical school at the University of Saskatchewan, residency at McGill University and fellowship/PhD at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. She has also held faculty appointments at the University of Ottawa and McGill University. She currently sits on the Physician Wellness Committees at Burnaby and Royal Columbian Hospitals as well the Fraser Health Regional Committee. Having personally experienced burnout, bullying and medical limitations, she is a passionate advocate for physician wellness and especially for trainees, who experience more stresses and who are more vulnerable. Her area of interest/research involves mind-body practices to improve physician wellness in addition to resident wellness. When she’s not working, she enjoys hiking, backpacking, kayaking, downhill/backcountry skiing, glacier mountaineering, playing piano and learning to play the guitar!
Dr. Corree Laule
Dr. Laule is an MR physicist, a Professor in the Departments of Radiology and Pathology & Laboratory Medicine, Vice Chair of Research in Radiology, and an Associate Director of the International Collaboration on Repair Discoveries (ICORD) at the University of British Columbia. She is also an associate member of the Department of Physics & Astronomy, where she is actively involved in the Medical Physics program. Dr. Laule heads an interdisciplinary research program in multiple sclerosis and spinal cord injury spanning technical innovations to clinical translation. Her research on human brain and spinal cord MRI and histology is funded by NSERC, the MS Society of Canada, the Craig Nielsen Foundation and ICORD. With an h-index of 35, 98 publications and 250+ conference presentations, she has been cited more than 5000 times. She is an elected Senior Fellow of the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine and serves on many UBC and international committees each year, including the Radiology Awards Committee (co-chair) and the Radiology EDI committee. Dr. Laule is passionate about science communication and leads initiatives to increase diversity in Science-Technology-Engineering-Math including the ICORD Summer Research Program for Indigenous Youth.
Dr. Tanya Martin
Dr. Martin completed Dalhousie medical school in Halifax, NS, followed by fellowships in Breast Imaging and ER/Trauma Radiology at UBC in Vancouver. She is currently a staff at BC Cancer Vancouver and Associate staff at Vancouver General Hospital. Dr. Martin’s professional interests include UBC radiology residency training and global outreach. She is a strong proponent of early and structured professionalism training in medicine.
Dr. Anvita Pauranik
I am a Pediatric Neuroradiologist at the BC Children’s Hospital, Clinical lead for the division of Neuroradiology, Assistant Professor of Radiology at UBC. Having worked as Pediatric Neuroradiologist at the Alberta Children’s Hospital and now at the busy BC Children’s Hospital, I have been in the quest for various mindfulness techniques that may help me navigate the challenging worlds of Academic Radiology and a budding Family life.
At work, I am passionate about protocol development, in an effort to streamline our provincial pediatric neuroimaging, improving efficacy while retaining quality and building a strong core team at the BC Children’s Hospital.
Away from work, I enjoy hiking and biking with my family. We have a 5 year old daughter who amuses us everyday with her thoughtfulness and charm.
Dr. Talia Vertinsky
I am a full time clinical neuroradiologist, associate professor of radiology at UBC, radiologist for the UBC MRI research centre, Chief Financial Officer of Vancouver Imaging and mother of two young children. I have hobbies, including yoga, dance and jiu jitsu and I enjoy time with friends and family. I chose an academic career because of a strong interest in research and enjoyment of the challenge and stimulation of teaching and working in new and changing environments. I enjoy the contrast and balance between my rewarding career and home life. I feel that work and home life can exist in harmony and enhance and enrich each other when we find the proper balance for ourselves and embrace wellness practices.
Dr. Joanna Yuen
Joanna is a current PGY2 resident in the UBC Diagnostic radiology program. In addition to previous volunteer work in mental health and mentoring, she served as the treasurer for a province-wide medical school conference emphasizing health and wellness. She hopes to contribute a resident perspective to the wellness committee.
Dr. Patel Roshni
Academic Half Day, April 6, 2022
- Matthew Haber, MD: Trainee Burnout
- Jennifer Uyeda, MD: Resident wellness program- our experience so far
- Shanna Matalon, MD and Neena Kapoor, MD: Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: What Can Radiology Departments Do
- Krista Suarez-Weiss, MD: New parents support group for trainees and junior faculty
- Jake Mandell, MD: Why you can’t concentrate, and what to do about it
Grand Rounds, April 6th, 2022
Dr. Fiona Fennessy
Burnout, Resilience and Team-Building