Network for End of Life Studies

Master's Students

 

Julie Avery

Julie has a faculty appointment in the Dalhousie School of Health Sciences and is certified with the Canadian Association of Medical Radiation Technologists and Nova Scotia Association of Medical Radiation Technologists. In 2013, while  completing her Master's of Health Administration at Dalhousie, she worked with Grace Johnston on an invited paper for the Advocate, the journal of the Ontario Society of Medical Technologists, on the relevance of palliative and end of life care research developments. For her MHA residency, Julie worked with Jan Jenson and others on the extended role of the paramedic, and also with Kristin Schmitz, Executive Director, Saint Vincent's Nursing Home, on the needs for palliative care.

 

Parveen Brar

In 2013, as an Master's of Health Administration student, Parveen worked with Grace Johnston, Lynn Lethbridge and others to prepare a literature review and draft a paper from 3x3 NELS findings on end of life with congestive heart failure. During her MHA Residency in the summer of 2013 at CancerControl Alberta she gained an interest in advance care planning.  Her work was presented at the 2014 Montreal International Congress on Palliative Care as a poster entitled: Estimating need for advance care planning for persons at end of life with cardiovascular disease.

Rodd Clark

While he was a Master's of Science student in Community Health and Epidemiology, Rodd was also an IMPART Resident in the College of Pharmacy. Rodd is now in Medical School at Dalhousie. His IMPART research project was carried out by working with Judith Fisher, Ingrid Sketris and Grace Johnston. Provincial Prescription Monitoring Progam data were analysed. This work was published: Clark R, Fisher J, Sketris IS, Johnston G (2012) Population prevalence of high dose paracetamol in dispensed paracetamol /opioid combinations: An observational study. BMC Pharmacology and Toxicology 12(1):11 DOI: 10.1186/1472-6904-12-11

Jessica Dooley

In 2007, Jessica was a Community Health and Epidemiology MSc candidate who worked with Louise Parker on an ICE Project 3 exploring issues for children and youth at end of life. Jessica prepared a poster entitled, Infant, Child and Youth Mortality and End of Life Care in Nova Scotia, that summarizes the work she's did while working with NELS. This early work, along with prior work of Dorothy Barnard, enabled discussions leading to support at the IWK Health Centre for other trainees (Jennifer Williams, Rebecca Earle, Alix Carter) to take on further NELS-related research projects.

Margaret Donahue  

Margaret completed her Master's of Applied Health Services Research in 2012 on Being-Breathless-In-The-World: A Heideggerian Hermeneutic Phenomenological Interpretation of the Lived Experience of Advanced Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). Margaret worked with Graeme Rocker, Cathy Simpson, and Joanne Young on ICE Project 7. She gained qualitative research expertise from Raewyn Bassett.

Jun Gao

From 2003 to 2009, Jun worked with NELS on the development of end of life cancer surveillance, reporting and measures. This included data quality assessment, logistic regression, CART and geographic mapping. During that time period, he was a new MSc (Statistics) graduate working as a Statistical Analyst with Cancer Care Nova Scotia (CCNS). In 2009, Jun moved to Ottawa and began work as a Biostatistician with Health Canada. While at CCNS, Jun worked with others (Ruth Lavergne, Trevor Dummer, Dorianne Rheaume) on papers on palliative care program enrollment, palliative radiation, and development of an algorithm for the nursing home being a place of residence or place of death. Posters that he contributed to are: Palliative Radiotherapy: Associations with age and nursing home residency for adults dying of cancer 2000-2005. Minimum Data Set for Palliative and End of Life Research in Nova Scotia, Canada. Palliative Care Provision to Patients Dying from Cancer in Halifax and Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canada. Ten Years of Research on Access to and Predictors of End of Life Cancer Care, Nova Scotia, Canada

Jennifer Gillis

In 2009, Jenn was a Master's of Health Administration candidate at Dalhousie University. She worked with Grace Johnston on developing A Logic Model for End of Life and Palliative Care Services in Nova Scotia. In 2009, Jenn began medical school at Dalhousie University.

Farhana Kanth

In 2007, Farhana was a Dalhousie University Master's of Health Services Administration candidate. After her MHA, she  was employed as a Senior Policy Analyst with the Nova Scotia Department of Health. She worked with NELS on ICE Project 4 led by Victor Maddalena. Farhana completed a presentation on Cultural Competence in End of Life Care for Asian Indian Immigrants.

Junaid Kapra

In 2006, Junaid worked with NELS ICE just after he graduated from Dalhousie with his Master's of Health Informatics. In the fall of 2008, he began as a Research and Statistical Officer at Nova Scotia Vital Statistics. In 2006-2007, he worked on a palliative care program data review for District Health Authorities 1 to 7 which led to this report:

Palliative Care Program Data in District Health Authorities 1- 7 in Nova Scotia

Ruth Lavergne

From 2007 to 2009 she worked with Yukiko Asada on reviewing literature on equity measures for ICE Project 2. In 2008-09, she helped develop surveillance measures for NELS ICE, working with Jun Gao, Trevor Dummer, Dorianne Rheaume and Grace Johnston on access to palliative radiation. Ruth was an MSc candidate in Community and Health Epidemiology at Dalhousie University studying equity in rural health. In August 2009, Ruth began PhD studies at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, and then transferred in 2010 to the University of British Columbia where she will be graduating with her PhD in 2014. Ruth worked with Jun and Grace on using CART as a statistical tool to identify low palliative enrollment subpopulations: Palliative Radiotherapy: Associations with age and nursing home residency for adults dying of cancer 2000-2005. In 2013, Ruth again worked with NELS on care at end of life in rural Nova Scotia. Her papers with NELS include: Gao J, Johnston GM, Lavergne MR, McIntyre P (2011) Identifying population groups with low palliative care program enrolment using classification and regression tree analysis. Journal of Palliative Care 27(2): 98-106

Lavergne R, Johnston GM, Gao J, Dumont S, Burge F (2011) Exploring generalizability in a study of costs for community-based palliative care. Journal of Pain and Symptom Management 41(4): 779-787

Lavergne MR, Johnston GM, Gao J, Dummer TJB, Rheaume DE (2011) Variation in the use of palliative radiotherapy at end of life: Examining demographic, clinical, health service, and geographic factors in a population-based study. Palliative Medicine 25(2):101-110

André Maddison

André completed his MSc in the Department of Community Health and Epidemiology. André began Dalhousie Medical School in 2010. In 2009, André joined NELS ICE to work on ICE Project 2 with Yukiko Asada on Measuring and explaining inequities in end of life care in colorectal cancer patients in Nova Scotia. His MSc thesis was on Inequity in Access to Colorectal Cancer Services along the Continuum of Care in Nova Scotia. He has two publications from this work: Maddison AR, Asada Y, Urquhart R, Johnston G, Burge F, Porter G (2012) Inequity in access to guideline-recommended colorectal cancer treatment in Nova Scotia, Canada. Healthcare Policy 8(2):71-87

Maddison AR, Asada Y, Burge F, Johnston G, Urquhart R (2012) Inequalities in end-of-life care for colorectal cancer patients in Nova Scotia, Canada. Journal of Palliative Care 28(2):90-96

He also worked on Project 8 with Judith Fisher to produce Maddison A, Fisher J, Johnston G (2011) Preventive medications at end of life. Progress in Palliative Care 19(1):15-21. 

Suha Masalmeh

In 2009, Suha graduated with her Master's of Health Administration from Dalhousie University. In 2011, she began a two year medical program for foreign medical graduates to practice in Canada. In 2007-08 Suha did a review of family caregiver policy as part of ICE Project 8. She also drafted a paper on renal disease at end of life, and helped prepare a poster on this topic for presenattion at the Nova Scotia Hospice Palliative Care Association annual meeting. Dorothy Wang, another MHA student, then continued this work with the Nova Scotia Renal Program.

Caroline McNamee

Caroline commenced her Master's of Health Administration (MHA) in September 2014. She completed her MHA Residency in the spring/summer of 2015 at the Toronto Central Community Care Access Centre where she worked on a palliative care project analyzing the psychosocial supports available to patients and families.  In the Fall of 2015, she completed an MHA directed project course with Grace Johnston using the Change Guide developed by Dr. Hsien Seow to describe the stage of Development of the Palliative Care Model in the Tri-Facilities area of Nova Scotia.

Shauna McVorran

Shauna McVorran graduated from the Master's of Health Services Administration program at Dalhousie University in 2007. In the fall of 2007, she returned to Trinidad to work in Management of Health Services. In the summer of 2007, she worked with NELS ICE on the development of the first Surveillance Report. A paper on her knowledge broker trainee role was published: Urquhart RL, Johnston GM, McVorran SM, Burge FI (2010) Perspectives of an interdisciplinary research team to engage practice: lessons from a knowledge exchange trainee experience Healthcare Policy 5(4):47-57  

Andy Muise

Andy is a Master's of Health Administration Candidate at Dalhousie University who will be working in 2013/14 with NELS and Emergency Health Services (EHS) as part of his Master’s thesis, with Grace Johnston as his primary supervisor. His research will utilize 3X3 NELS data to examine the impact and potential of the EHS Extended Care Paramedic (ECP) program on Nova Scotia’s health system.  His work was presented at the 2014 Montreal International Congress on Palliative Care as a poster entitled: Expanding the scope of paramedicine for palliative patients: populaton estimates from linked administrative data.  It was also presented at the International Association of Cancer registries Conference in Ottawa as an oral presentation called Planning expanded scope paramedicine for palliative cancer patients using population-based linked administrative data.

Patricia Murray

Patricia graduated from the Dalhousie Master's of Health Services Administration program in 2008. For her MHSA Senior Seminar she worked on Documentation of End of Life Pediatric Care with Dr Gerri Frager and others at the IWK Health Centre's palliative program, for ICE Project 3. Patricia is now the Director of Children’s Services at the Nova Scotia Department of Health.

Meaghan O'Brien

Meaghan graduated with her Master's of Health Services Administration from Dalhousie University in 2005. She then completed a Medical degree at Dalhousie University and Internal Medicine residency at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg. In addition to her MHSA thesis, she lead in the publlication of: O’Brien MB, Johnston GM, Gao J, Dewar R (2007) End of life care for Nursing Home Residents Dying of Cancer in Nova Scotia, 2000-2003. Supportive Care in Cancer 15:1015-1021 Posters that she helped complete are Palliative Care Provision to Patients Dying from Cancer in Halifax and Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canada and Ten Years of Research on Access to and Predictors of End of Life Cancer Care, Nova Scotia, Canada

Skylan Parker

Skylan Parker graduated with her Master's of Health Services Administration (MHA) from Dalhousie University in 2006. She worked on policy issues in the Yukon health department until 2013 when she returned to Nova Scotia. During her MHA program Skylan completed work with NELS ICE on end of life care in Aboriginal communities. Slides from her presentation: Cultural Competence in End of Life Care for Mi’kmaq. This work led to the following publication: Johnston G, Vukic A, Parker S, (2013) Cultural understanding in the provision of supportive and palliative care: Perspectives in relation to an indigenous population. BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care 3:61-68 doi: 10.1136/bmjspcare-2011-000122

Sheri Roach

Sheri was a joint MHA/MN student. She completed her Master's of Nursing (MN) thesis in 2012 on Socioeconomic Predictors of Short Diagnosis to Death Following Colorectal Cancer Diagnosis: A Population-Based Study using Recursive Partitioning. Her Nursing thesis supervisors were Audrey Steenbeek and Margot Latimer. She also worked with Grace Johnston, Robin Urquart and Mo Abdolell, and used data from the COR NET ACCESS grant. She presented a work-in-progress poster at the annual meeting of the Nova Scotia Hospice Palliative Care Association, and a paper is being prepared for publication.

Sarbjeet Singh

Sarbjeet graduated from the Master's of Health Administration program at Dalhousie University in 2009. He worked with NELS and Dion Mouland, Executive Director, Oceanview Continuing Care Centre to complete his Senior Seminar on Challenges in Providing Quality End-of-Life Care in Long-Term-Care Facilities.

Dorothy Wang

In Dorothy's final year as a Master's of Health Administration student, she worked with Susan McNeil, Manager, and others at the Nova Scotia Renal Program (NSRP) to prepare an overview of palliative and end of life care for persons with advanced renal disease: Best Practices in Palliative Care for Patients with End Stage Renal Disease. The NSRP developed this paper further and used it as a background document for distribution prior to a very successful provinical meeting in May 2012 of palliative care and renal dialysis professionals from all nine district health authorities in the province.

Jennifer Williams

Jennifer completed her Master's of Nursing at Dalhousie University and works at the IWK Health Centre as the Professional Development Coordinator for the Reproductive Care areas and the Medical Surgical units. Prior to this she was a nurse in the neonatal intensive care unit for 6 years. Jennifer's MN thesis is associated with ICE Project 3 which explores issues for children and youth at end of life. Her project is a qualitative study entitled Neonatal Palliative Care: Inter-professional Communication and Collaboration.

Hillary Woodside

In 2012, Hillary commenced her MA in Kinesiology with Dr Melanie Keats; a co-investigator on the ABC-SC project. Hillary is studying the perspectives of youth and young adults with advanced cancer on the value of yoga as a form of palliative support. Hillary and Melanie have published:

H. Woodside & M. Keats. (2012) Exploring the Role of Physical Activity During Palliative Care for Adolescent and Young Adult Cancer Patients. Journal of Adolescent and Young Adult Oncology. doi:10.1089/jayao.2012.0016

Photo: BHCRI

Hao Wu

Hao worked with Victor Maddalena while he was a Master's student in Community Medicine at Memorial University in St John's Newfoundland. He plans to gradute in 2014. The focus of Hao's research was perspectives on palliative and end of life care by immigrants from South East Asia.

Alison Zwaagstra

After completing her Master's of Health Informatics at Dalhousie University in 2007, Alison joined NELS ICE as a full time Health Information Analyst in January 2008. In July 2008, Alison successfully challenged the Canadian College of Health Information Management certification examination. She holds current membership with both the Canadian and Nova Scotia Health Information Management Associations. In July 2009, Alison began as a Research and Statistical Officer - Quality with Addiction Prevention and Treatment Services at Capital District Health Authority (CDHA). Alison analyzed Vital Statistics data, prepared descriptive reports on persons dying of chronic diseases in Nova Scotia, and shared these reports with key stakeholders. Copies of her reports on renal disease, cancer, COPD, diabetes, Parkinson's and MS can be found under ICE Project 1, as well as slides and audio of a work-in-progress session she gave in 2008. While working with NELS ICE, Alison also prepared the poster Minimum Data Set for Palliative and End of Life Research in Nova Scotia, Canada. Alison's work with NELS ICE is included under ICE Project 1 and is summarized in NELS News Issue 2.