JUNE 12: The Toronto Mayoral Election

With all the hype surrounding the race to become mayor of Toronto, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that the mayor has just one of 26 votes at City Council. Does it really matter who the mayor is with regards to local health care issues? Do the goings on at City Hall make any difference to our health and the health of our patients?

You are invited to spend an evening with Chris Moise, one of Toronto’s City Councilors and Chair of the Board of Health, to explore these questions.

Learn about some of Toronto’s health issues here .

This election is an opportunity to think about and raise questions about health from the local perspective, from climate change to road safety, from housing issues to sheltering the unhoused, from food insecurity to healthy eating options for all, from the opioid crisis to, well, the list goes on and on once you start thinking about it.

How does city government work? How can we as physicians work with our elected officials to improve the health of our fellow citizens beyond the mayoral election?

Please join us to examine the possibilities.

Introducing: The Soapbox Sessions, May 16 & 30

 As spring slowly breezes in with its air of renewal, The Doctors’ Lounge Series is inspired to try something new.

You are invited to spend  one or two evenings with colleagues who are leaders in their fields.

You will be allowed to ask them anything.

But first, you will hear short presentations from them on things they feel you should know, but might be unaware of.

 

On May 16, you are invited to spend an evening with the following Chairs of  Sections/MIG:

Eye Physicians & Surgeons: Dr. Richard Weinstein

Critical Care Medicine: Dr. David Katz

Complementary & Integrative Medicine: Dr. Esther Konigsberg

 

On May 30, you are invited to spend an evening with the following Chairs of  Sections:

Public Health Physicians: Dr. Piotr Oglaza

Addiction Medicine: Dr. Christopher Cavcuiti

Psychiatry: Dr. Renata Villela (see this recommended resource list  https://eopa.ca/resources/patient-services-education )

 

Please join us in the collegial (but still  virtual) atmosphere of the Doctors’ Lounge as we begin what will hopefully be the first of many similar evenings for years to come.

The CMAJ on Doctors' Lounges ( as we enter year 19 of our program)

 https://cmajnews.com/2023/01/26/physician-lounge-1096038/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=physician-lounge-1096038

March 20: The Return of our Annual Festival of Medical Storytelling

The Doctors’ Lounge  Festival of Medical Storytelling returns March 20.

It is an evening dedicated to sharing stories, poems, songs and artwork about your experiences as a physician within the health-care system, whether as a provider or as a recipient of medical care.

Presenters are asked to keep their contributions to less than 5 minutes (we welcome creative efforts in pieces of one minute or less. In the past, some of these shorter presentations have been quite moving. It is amazing what can be conveyed in a few words! ).

Even if you are not prepared to be a presenter, feedback from audience members will hopefully make this a fully interactive experience. Dr. Rex Kay of Ars Medica: A Journal of Medicine, The Arts and Humanities will be on hand to give insightful feedback on the creative efforts presented. Ars Medica is an award-winning Toronto-based literary journal which explores illness, healing, perceptions of the body, and encounters with health-care.

To kick off the evening, we will be hearing from our President, Dr. Rose Zacharias, who will be sharing her love for medical narrative based on her own personal experiences as well as the stories shared with her by colleagues as President of the OMA. Dr. Zacharias is a certificant of the Harvard Media and Medicine Program.

Let’s celebrate World Storytelling Day as was our tradition prior to the pandemic (well, almost: this event will take place virtually, but it opens up the possibility of hearing from our colleagues who will be able to participate from outside of Toronto).

Time to let the creative juices flow just in time for spring.

Interested in more training in narrative medicine? See: https://narrativebasedmedicine.ca/foundation/

Feb 28: An Evening with Dr. Geoffrey Cohen

 OMA membership means that you are part of a unique group that makes up about 0.2% of Ontario’s population.

However, being a member of an organization does not necessarily mean that you feel a sense of belonging to that group.

What does it take to make that transformation?

Evidence is mounting that a sense of belonging can be as important for maintaining health as diet, exercise and sleep.

Many of our patients  manifest their lack of  a sense of belonging with physical and mental health complaints. Is there anything you as a clinician can do to address the root source of their problems?

You are invited to contemplate these questions by spending an evening exploring the science of belonging with Dr. Geoffrey L. Cohen, author of Belonging: The Science of Creating Connection and Bridging Divides .

Please join us to enjoy the feeling of belonging with colleagues at our next Doctors’ Lounge event.

RE: The sense of belonging for Torontonians, see page 52: https://www.environicsinstitute.org/docs/default-source/default-document-library/tf---scs2022---final---digital-final-ua52844d4113104e2899d928c42c4c367f.pdf?sfvrsn=69940316_0

The impact of COVID on belonging and its health implications https://spssi.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/sipr.12086

January 25: An Evening with Elizabeth Svoboda

As we enter 2023, operating within a system that is collapsing all around us, you may be asking yourself, how can I go on helping others ?

To gain perspective, a bigger question might be, what motivates you to help others? What happens when one’s identity transforms into that of “ the helper?”

You are invited to spend an hour with Elizabeth Svoboda, author of What Makes a Hero: The Surprising Science of Selflessness to explore the subject matter of her book.

In the second hour, her recent article in Scientific American on moral injury will serve as the starting point for a discussion, as we share thoughts about moral injury, an emerging phenomenon that you will be hearing more about in the coming years.

You and members of your support system are invited to join your colleagues on Bell’s Let’s Talk Day to do just that: talk, and just as importantly, listen.

December 13: an Evening With Dr. Lilit Garibyan

 The Doctors’ Lounge Series, home of medical imagineering in Toronto, invites you to our final event of 2022 in collaboration with one of Harvard’s team of medical imagineers.

The Magic Wand Initiative has a decade’s worth of experience encouraging transformation of clinical observation into clinical innovation.

Dr. Lilit Garibyan is the co-Founder and Director of the Magic Wand Institute.

Please join us to explore how your clinical insights might contribute to the collective wisdom within the greater medical mind.

This December, set your imagination free.