Chair's Report - Spring 2025
/Dear Colleagues,
It’s hard to believe but we’re already well into 2025, a year that seems to be flying by. Your executive has been busy advocating for us and our profession and working to build a section that allows our members to thrive. Below are a few key highlights of the past few months.
Funding Updates
Recently, the Negotiations Task Force (NTF) announced two confirmed targeted investments, including additional funding for Emergency Medicine and Northern Ontario physicians. While these investments are encouraging and reflect growing recognition of urgent system needs, our anesthesia proposals to address our critical anesthesiologist shortage need to remain a top priority. We reiterated this to them in a formal letter submitted to the OMA CEO and the NTF on May 23, 2025. We will continue to stay actively engaged to ensure that anesthesiology remains at the forefront of the province’s health human resources planning and that further funding decisions reflect the urgency of our specialty’s needs.
Governance Updates
Two New Executives
I’m absolutely delighted to welcome two exceptional leaders to our executive team! Back in February, Dr. Sylvie Aucoin was acclaimed as our new Vice-Chair, and Dr. Jason Taam was elected as a Member-at-Large. While their terms formally began on May 2, they hit the ground running and have been actively collaborating with the executive since day minus one hundred. Their energy, insight, and commitment will have a meaningful impact, and I couldn’t be more excited to have them at the table.
Dr. Sylvie Aucoin brings a wealth of experience as an anesthesiologist based in Ottawa. She has been a long-standing leader in both academic and clinical anesthesia, and her passion for system improvement and mentorship shines through in everything she does. Sylvie has emerged as a leading voice in shaping the future of anesthesiology in Canada. Last year she delivered a national presentation at the Canadian Anesthesiologists’ Society (CAS) Annual Meeting’s closing ceremony on the timely and evolving topic of “Task Shifting and Task Sharing in Evolving Canadian Anesthesiology Care.” This thought-provoking presentation is helping to inform and inspire how we approach workforce sustainability and innovation across the country. Her leadership and forward-thinking approach are a tremendous asset to our section.
Dr. Jason Taam is a Toronto-based anesthesiologist who brings valuable experience from both academic and community hospital settings. His interests include perioperative care, physician wellness, and advancing strategic workforce solutions. Jason is known for his thoughtful, balanced leadership style and his ability to foster productive dialogue across diverse perspectives. His contributions to our executive have already strengthened our work and our capacity to deliver value to members.
Please join me in giving Sylvie and Jason a warm and enthusiastic welcome. We’re incredibly fortunate to have such talented, passionate individuals helping lead our profession forward!
OMA AGM and Priority and Leadership Meeting
On May 1, the OMA held its Annual General Meeting, a celebration of leadership, progress, and the collective voice of Ontario physicians. At the meeting, which I had the privilege of attending, we expressed our sincere gratitude to Dr. Dominik Nowak, the outgoing OMA President, for his thoughtful and steadfast leadership. During his tenure, Dr. Nowak took a personal interest in the HHR challenges facing anesthesiology and offered his support for our ongoing advocacy around Team-Based Anesthesia Care. His willingness to engage with our section and amplify the urgency of our message at the provincial level did not go unnoticed, and we thank him sincerely for standing with us.
We also enthusiastically welcomed Dr. Zainab Abdurrahman as the new OMA President for 2025–26. A pediatric allergist from the GTA, Dr. Abdurrahman brings passion, fresh energy, and a strong focus on equity and system transformation, values that deeply resonate with our specialty. We look forward to building a strong working relationship with her and continuing our collaboration with the OMA under her leadership, especially as we push forward with solutions to Ontario’s anesthesia care access crisis.
The 2025 AGM was a powerful reminder of what’s possible when specialties unite around shared priorities. Ontario’s Anesthesiologists is proud to contribute to this collective momentum, elevating urgent conversations around workforce sustainability, innovative models like Team-Based Anesthesia Care (TBAC), and the need to modernize compensation frameworks to reflect today’s realities. TBAC, our updated model based on the original Anesthesia Care Team (ACT) pilot from the early 2000s, empowers anesthesiologists to lead multidisciplinary teams with trained health-care professionals, such as anesthesia assistants to increase surgical capacity safely. At the AGM, I had the opportunity to speak directly with current and incoming OMA board members and leadership to spotlight the deepening anesthesia shortages across Ontario from teaching hospitals to rural and remote communities, and to share first-hand stories from our members on the front lines. Overall, the AGM was a meaningful chance to express the pressures our members experience every day, and to celebrate the inauguration of Dr. Abdurrahman.
In late May 2025, some of your OA executives attended the OMA’s Priority and Leadership Group meeting. This biannual meeting brings together physician leaders from across the province to receive updates from and question the OMA senior leadership, and to collaborate on advancing key issues and priorities for the association.
Your executives attend to ensure that our collective voices are represented in the room, ensuring our specialty’s unique challenges and perspectives, particularly around workforce shortages, sustainable care models, and relativity, remain part of the broader leadership conversation. It was an opportunity to connect directly with colleagues from all corners of the system and reinforce the importance of maintaining anesthesia as a visible advocacy priority. The energy and collaboration in the room were a reminder of the strength we have when specialties work together toward shared goals.
Member Services
Let’s shift gears for a moment and celebrate you, our amazing members!
First off, a huge thank-you to everyone who has already paid their voluntary section dues. Your support fuels everything we do. It’s what allows Ontario’s Anesthesiologists to speak up for you at the Ministry, at the OMA, and across the province. Every dollar goes right back into advocating for our specialty and elevating our profession.
If you haven’t had a chance to pay yet, no worries! You can do it anytime through your OMA account. And as a bonus, paid members enjoy 20% off registration for the Ontario Anesthesia Meeting. That’s a sweet deal and a great reason to get involved.
We’re also thrilled to share that our Leadership Development Grant Program has been refreshed and is now open for applications! If you’ve been thinking about stepping into a leadership role or just want to build your skills, this is a great way to get started. Applications are open until September 5, and we’d love to see your name in the mix.
Finally, let’s celebrate a few of the incredible folks in our community:
Dr. Connor Brenna received the 2024 Resident Award at our virtual Transition-to-Practice event on November 8.
Dr. Natalie Clavel was featured in December’s Member Spotlight.
Dr. Jonathan Hooper was featured in January’s blog post.
Dr. Viren Naik was featured in our new blog series on anesthesia human resources.
Dr. Peter Menikefs was featured in our April Member Spotlight.
Dr. Jason Taam was featured in our May Member Spotlight.
Dr. Barbara Bertram was featured in our latest AHR blog post.
If you are active on social media, we encourage you to engage with our posts, including sharing them in your feed. Your stories, your impact, your leadership, it all matters. And we’re so proud to have each of you as part of our vibrant and growing community.
OAM Updates
Thank you to everyone who completed our survey on the future of the OAM. Your insights are helping to shape how we design and deliver a compelling 2026 experience.
But first—mark your calendars! Planning for the 2025 OAM is well underway, and we’re excited to invite you to the 70th edition of this leading academic gathering for anesthesiologists across the province. This year’s program promises dynamic discussions and hands-on learning, including plenary sessions:
- Dr. Mary Hanna (The Ottawa Hospital): Mass Casualties Triage from Urban to Remote: What You Need to Know + a Mock Code Orange Simulation
- Dr. Andrew Healey (St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton): The Gift Begins Here – From Death Determination to Organ Recovery
We are also bringing back the Top 5 Anesthesia Papers of the year and offering practical management pearls such as delirium prevention, insulin management and so much more. We hope to see you for another unforgettable meeting that blends clinical excellence, system leadership, and peer connection.
We would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to Dr. Tammy Byford and Dr. Sarah McIsaac for their outstanding leadership as the Chair and Academic Chair of the Ontario Anesthesiologists’ Meeting for the past five and two years respectively. Their dedication, insight, and vision have been instrumental in elevating the academic and organizational quality of the meeting, and we are deeply grateful for their contributions.
As their terms conclude, we are now seeking new, engaged members who are passionate about education, advocacy, and collaboration to take on these key leadership roles. If you're interested in shaping the future of OAM and building on the strong foundation they’ve laid, we welcome you to consider putting your name forward. Feel free to reach out to myself or any of our executives.
Advocacy & Stakeholder Relations Updates
I’m pleased to share some encouraging updates from your section as we continue to champion the expansion of Team-Based Anesthesia Care, also known as TBAC, across Ontario.
Working in partnership with the OMA, we’re gaining traction and there is clear momentum and alignment building. We truly believe we’re at a critical inflection point.
During last November’s Queen’s Park Day, we met directly with MPPs and emphasized the need for targeted investments in TBAC models to address the anesthesia workforce gap and improve access to care. I’m pleased to report that our message was well received, and several MPPs expressed a willingness to support and facilitate ongoing discussions on sustainable workforce solutions.
Our advocacy has also reached the highest levels. We had a very constructive meeting with Minister of Health, Sylvia Jones, where we discussed how TBAC can play a transformative role in expanding care capacity and ensuring timely access to surgical and procedural services. The Ministry committed to reviewing our joint TBAC proposal, which was submitted in collaboration with the OMA and supported by its analytics and economic experts, with further consultations planned. This is a significant step forward.
We also initiated key conversations with Ontario Health. We met directly with Dr. Christopher Simpson and Judy Linton, both are Executive Vice-Presidents and Chief Medical Executives at Ontario Health. We subsequently opened dialogue with Matt Anderson, President and CEO of Ontario Health. These engagements focused on integrating TBAC into the broader provincial health strategy, and we are optimistic about future collaboration to support province-wide implementation.
On the academic side, Dr. Aucoin and I have joined the Toronto Academic Health Science Network workforce planning committee as your Ontario’s Anesthesiologists liaisons. Encouragingly, Toronto’s academic hospitals are beginning to align on a more coordinated approach to TBAC, which bodes well for training, leadership, and system readiness.
We were proud to see our efforts highlighted during the recent OMA Town Hall, featuring the OMA and CMA presidents, an indication that our work is gaining broader recognition and support.
Thank you to all the department chiefs and clinical leaders who took the time to complete our recent HHR survey. Your engagement is not only appreciated, it is essential. The insights you’ve provided continue to shape our advocacy and form the foundation of our proposals, whether to the OMA or MOH.
Most importantly, your active engagement is deeply valued by our counterparts at both the OMA and the MOH. It sends a powerful message: Ontario’s Anesthesiologists are united, engaged, and solution-focused. This cohesion helps us gain traction in collaborative discussions and ensures our specialty remains top-of-mind in broader system planning. Together, we are helping define the future of anesthesia care in Ontario; one that is better resourced, more innovative, and built on the collective strength of your voices.
Environmental Sustainability Working Group Update
Our ESWG members continue educating anesthesia departments on the benefits of ditching the des, nixing the nitrous and greening ORs. A few of their other activities:
- Dr. Anita Rao, our ESWG Lead, presented as part of the “Climate Rounds: Desflurane Needs to Des-appear” webinar hosted by the Canadian Medical Association and Choosing Wisely Canada.
- Dr. Rao and ESWG member Mike Apostol presented a Canadian Coalition for Green Health Care webinar, “Rethinking Nitrous Oxide in Health Care: An Environmental and Economic Initiative.”
- In an abstract titled, “IPAC and Anesthesiology: Collaborating for Sustainability”, which was co-authored by Madeleine Ashcroft and Drs. Melissa Ho, Lisa Hutchinson and David Ohrling and accepted as a poster at IPAC Canada’s conference, it was highlighted that initial discussions with ESWG members Drs. Ohrling, Ho and Hutchinson, “sparked much-needed focus on sustainability in IPAC, leading to the development of IPAC Canada’s position statement on environmental stewardship, sustainability, and planetary health related to IPAC, and paved the way for collaboration on additional sustainability applications. Creation of a guidance document to reduce the vast amount of plastic waste from anesthetic circuit tubing was the first such example.” IPAC’s Position Statement on Environmental Stewardship, Sustainability, and Planetary Health Related to IPAC has been finalized and may be distributed to your IPAC team and colleagues.
Looking Ahead: Consider Getting Involved
While nominations for executive roles are not open until November, we invite all members who are passionate about advocacy, leadership, and the future of our specialty to start thinking about how they might contribute. Whether you’re interested in helping shape system-wide solutions like Team-Based Anesthesia Care (TBAC), amplifying physician voices, or supporting the sustainability of anesthesia services across Ontario, your engagement matters.
Our section thrives on the insight and experience of anesthesiologists from all practice types and regions. If you're curious about how to get involved, now is a great time to reach out, learn more about the work of the executive, and consider where your unique perspective can add value. Together, we can continue to elevate the profile of our profession and build a strong future for anesthesia in Ontario.
Before closing, I want to sincerely thank each and every one of you for your unwavering dedication and hard work. I know this continues to be a demanding time for all of us, and I want you to know that your Ontario’s Anesthesiologists executive team is fully committed to supporting you. We are focused on making sure you have what you need to thrive, today and into the future.
Please don’t hesitate to reach out to me or any member of the executive team if you have questions, ideas, or simply need support. We are here for you.
Wishing each of you a restful and joyful summer, you’ve certainly earned it.
Sincerely,
Dr. Cindy Wang
Chair, Ontario's Anesthesiologists, A Section of the Ontario Medical Association