Conference galvanizes a movement for patient-oriented research in BC

 

Over 500 people joined the Putting Patients First conference in Vancouver on November 14.


 

The Putting Patients First conference brought together over 500 people from BC and beyond to learn about collaborating for health improvement.

 

Putting Patients First 2024 was the seventh annual conference focused on patient-oriented research in BC. Over 420 people registered for the event, 333 people joined in-person with an additional 174 online.

 

“The Putting Patients First conference is a flagship event for patient-oriented research in BC,” says Monica Mamut, unit director, BC SUPPORT Unit. “Everyone who attended is part of a community that prioritizes patients, communities and the public in health research. I’m grateful the conference connected people and shared new ideas to make lasting changes in the health system.”

 

This year’s theme was ‘building learning communities.’ The conference goal was to advance learning communities to improve health and health research ecosystems.

 

Highlights included a keynote address by Dr. Robert Reid from the Institute for Better Health, who spoke on the urgency of adopting learning health systems in BC and across Canada. Dr. Kerry Kuluski from the University of Toronto shared how she helped hospital teams use a learning health systems approach.

 

Three interactive rooms offered spaces for collaboration and sharing ideas. In one room, attendees played a card game that allowed participants to solve challenges in patient-oriented research. Another room used the arts to integrate lived experience into learning communities. A third room featured learning health systems projects from across BC.

 

An outstanding 90 abstracts were submitted to Putting Patients First. Of these, 55 were selected to display posters at the conference. Three of these teams were selected to provided oral presentations. One team received the POR Champion award, provided in honour of Pat Atherton who was a champion for patient-oriented research in BC. Congratulations to the team presenting “Project IMPACT (Include Messaging for Patients and Care Teams): Patient Centered Care in Paediatric Type 1 Diabetes Using Texting-Spreading in Interior Health.”

 

Watch the presentation recordings on our YouTube channel.

 

View more conference highlights.

 

The BC SUPPORT Unit, part of Michael Smith Health Research BC, is hosting the annual Putting Patients First conference.

2024 conference highlights

Dr. Robert Reid dressed formally, speaking energetically at a podium on a stage, against dark curtains.

 

“Learning health systems is about partnerships. It’s about partnerships between care systems and researchers. It’s about bringing patients – their experiences, their aspirations – into the centre.”

 

– Robert Reid, during his keynote on actioning learning health systems

Dr. Robert Reid dressed formally, speaking at a podium on a stage, against dark curtains.

“Remember these two words: collective impact. We can’t do this alone. We can do so much more together than we can independently.”

 

– Kerry Kuluski, during her session on engaging learning health systems

A poster presenter shares their project during the Poster Showcase, at the conference's interactive session. Their poster is displayed on a screen behind them.

A poster presenter talks about their project during the interactive Poster Showcase.

 

 

Conference attendees sit at a table with folded origami hats on it. The hats have words that describe different roles that the attendees play in their lives, like "son."

Attendees engage in an interactive arts-based activity that demonstrates the many roles we play in our lives.

2024 photo gallery

Conference program

 

Sessions in the Pinnacle Ballroom will be livestreamed and recorded.

Posters are available for viewing throughout the day.

View our photo notification form.

 

Time

Event

Location

7:00 a.m. –
8:00 a.m.

Registration and breakfast

Foyer, Pinnacle Ballroom
7:00 a.m. onwards

Posters available for viewing

 

Posters will be displayed throughout the day:

  • From 7:00 a.m. to 12:45 p.m., posters will be displayed in the Point Grey Room.

 

From 10:30 a.m. to 12:45 p.m., you can join an interactive Poster Showcase and Q&A session with poster presenters in the Point Grey Room. There will be two different sessions based on poster themes.

 

  • From 12:45 p.m. to 4:00 p.m., posters will be displayed in the Foyer.
Various
8:00 a.m. –
8:15 a.m.

Territorial acknowledgment

Opening prayer

 

Elder Ruth Alfred

Pinnacle Ballroom
8:15 a.m. –
8:30 a.m.

Welcoming remarks

 

Monica Mamut, Unit Director, BC SUPPORT Unit

Linda Riches, Patient Partner

Pinnacle Ballroom
8:30 a.m. –
9:30 a.m.

Actioning learning health systems

Keynote: Dr. Robert Reid
Hazel McCallion Research Chair in Learning Health Systems, Institute for Better Health
Senior Vice President, Science, Trillium Health Partners

 

Hear about developing learning health systems in North America. This includes using a whole-systems approach, spreading and scaling solutions, and centring equity.

 

Moderator: Monica Mamut, Unit Director, BC SUPPORT Unit

Pinnacle Ballroom
9:30 a.m. –
10:10 a.m.

Engaging learning health systems

 

Presenter: Dr. Kerry Kuluski
Dr. Mathias Gysler Research Chair in Patient and Family Centered Care, Institute for Better Health
Associate Professor at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, University of Toronto

 

Learn how three Ontario hospitals deliver high-quality acute and community care. Hospital teams use new approaches that centre on patients and families.

Pinnacle Ballroom
10:10 a.m. –
10:30 a.m.

Health break

Foyer, Pinnacle Ballroom
10:30 a.m. –
12:45 p.m.

Interactive sessions

 

During this block, multiple sessions will run at the same time. You can choose which ones you would like to join.

 

In some rooms, you will join in small group activities to solve problems around important issues, including social identities, accessibility, and learning communities. Poster abstracts will also be available for viewing. There will be opportunities for networking.

 

Learn more about the interactive sessions.

 

A

Solutions room

 

Dundarave Room

B

Ideas and innovation room

 

Shaughnessy Room

C

Learning health systems in action

 

Pinnacle Ballroom

D

Poster showcase

 

Point Grey Room

10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.

Session 1

Dundarave Room

10:30 a.m. – 11:35 a.m.

Session 1

Shaughnessy Room

10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.

Group 1

Point Grey Room

10:30 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

Continuous session

Pinnacle Ballroom

11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

Session 2

Dundarave Room

11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

Session 2

Shaughnessy Room

11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

Group 2

Point Grey Room

Various
12:45 p.m. –
1:45 p.m.

Lunch

Pinnacle Ballroom
1:45 p.m. –
2:45 p.m.

Panel: Perspectives on the patient-oriented research experience

 

In this panel, we’ll hear from teams about the challenges, successes and lessons learned.

 

Moderator: Ellie Griffith, Vice President Research Programs, Michael Smith Health Research BC

Pinnacle Ballroom
2:45 p.m. –
3:30 p.m.

Selected poster presentations

 

Selected poster presentations:

  • Project IMPACT (Include Messaging for Patients and Care Teams): Patient Centered Care in Paediatric Type 1 Diabetes Using Texting-Spreading in Interior Health
  • Get the Message? Improving Access to Virtual Healthcare for Older Adults Through Patient Partner Collaboration
  • Transforming Access to Pediatric Rheumatology Care for Remote and Rural Communities: Findings from the Northern BC Project
Pinnacle Ballroom
3:30 p.m. –
3:35 p.m.

Pat Atherton Award (POR Champion)

Pinnacle Ballroom
3:35 p.m. –
3:45 p.m.

Closing remarks

Lisa Ridgway, Patient Partner

Stirling Bryan, Chief Scientific Officer, Health Research BC

Pinnacle Ballroom
3:45 p.m. –
4:00 p.m.

Closing prayer

Elder Ruth Alfred

Pinnacle Ballroom

What are the interactive sessions?

 

During the interactive sessions, there will be multiple sessions running at the same time. You can choose which ones you would like to join.

 

 

A. Solutions room

 

Join small group activities and engage at multiple tables in a fun, game-like setting. Feedback will be collected and ideas generated from the session will be shared in a post-conference report. This takes place in the Dundarave Room.

 

The same session will run twice, to allow people to join at different times. If you are interested, please join just one of the two sessions:

  • Session 1: 10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.
  • Session 2: 11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

B. Ideas and innovation room

 

This arts-based session will explore ways to integrate lived experience into learning communities, through interactive activities and discussions. Your contribution in the session will help create a digital tool for sharing knowledge. This takes place in the Shaughnessy Room.

 

The same session will run twice, to allow people to join at different times. If you are interested, please join just one of the two sessions:

  • Session 1: 10:30 a.m. – 11:35 a.m.
  • Session 2: 11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

C. Learning health systems in action

 

This session will include presentations on projects related to learning health systems. This takes place in the Pinnacle Ballroom.

 

This is one continuous session from 10:30 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. Project presentations include:

D. Poster showcase

 

The poster showcase will invite you to engage with poster presenters and participate in facilitated discussions. This takes place in the Point Grey Room.

 

There are two different sessions based on the poster themes:

  • Group 1: 10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.

  • Group 2: 11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

 

 

Group 1: 10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. 

 

Poster themes:

  1. Chronic diseases and conditions
  2. Mental health and substance use
  3. Improving infrastructures for patient and community engagement (Part 1)
  4. Innovations in health care and health systems (Part 1)

 

Chronic diseases and conditions

  • Collaborating to Support Unhoused People with Wounds

  • Interior Health’s Collaboration to Rapid, Reliable STEMI Intervention

  • A patient-oriented multi-modal MRI study on myalgic encephalomyelitis / chronic fatigue syndrome

  • Project IMPACT (Include Messaging for Patients and Care Teams): Patient Centered Care in Paediatric Type 1 Diabetes Using Texting-Spreading in Interior Health *

  • Optimizing Diabetes Care: A Community-Partnered Qualitative Study on Patients with Pre- or Mild Diabetes

  • Empowering Women with Endometriosis and Adenomyosis through a bilingual, anonymous platform and Open Data outcomes

  • Feasibility of the patient‐reported outcome measure for the assessment of symptom burden in pediatric chronic kidney disease “PRO-Kid” in children aged 2-7 years

 

Mental health and substance use

  • Screening for trauma in a youth integrated care clinic (Foundry Vancouver); youth and staff experience

  • Evidence in Care: A Learning Community Approach to Rapid Evidence Reviews

  • Development of a unique advisory committee for mental health service improvements

  • Partnering with People Who Use Drugs to Create Safe Inclusive Health Care Spaces

  • Learning from Recovery College Peer Educators: A Participatory Research Project

  • Building a path towards patient-centered program success: Community perspectives on indicators of program success for an Individual Placement and Support (IPS) program for people with persistent and multiple barriers to employment in British Columbia, Canada.

  • Let’s talk about pain: A qualitative exploration of ways to introduce the current model of chronic pain to patients.

 

Improving infrastructures for patient and community engagement (Part 1)

  • Bringing lived experience to peer review: Collaborative development of a learning module

  • Rising Up: Collaborating with Chinese Families and Communities for Parenting Resources

  • Empowering the Citizen Patient

  • NEOCATS: Patient-led Resource Development for Clinical Trials

  • Engaging with patient and family partners to develop education materials

  • Transforming Research with Patients First: Building Capacity through POR eLearning

  • Bridging the Gap: Implementing the Transitional Care Approach for New Hemodialysis Patients

Innovations in health care and health systems (Part 1)

  • Every Move Matters: Royal Inland Hospital Patient Activation Team Keeps Patients Moving Forward

  • The Head and Neck Cancer Application for Patients and their Partners (HANC APP) Study: Co-designing through patient partner workshops

  • Co-developing a Period Pain Awareness Campaign with Youth as Research Partners

  • Implementing Patient-partnered Workshops in Regional Areas of British Columbia to Enhance Clinician Confidence in SCI Care

  • Get the Message? Improving Access to Virtual Healthcare for Older Adults Through Patient Partner Collaboration *

  • Transforming Access to Pediatric Rheumatology Care for Remote and Rural Communities: Findings from the Northern BC Project *

  • Design and Implementation of a Patient Advisory Council (PAC) for the Department of Anesthesia at Providence Health Care

 

* These posters were also selected for presentations and their teams will also present them at 2:45 p.m in the Pinnacle Ballroom.

Group 2: 11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m.

 

Poster themes:

  1. Indigenous health improvement
  2. Care and caregiving
  3. Improving infrastructures for patient and community engagement (Part 2)
  4. Innovations in health care and health systems (Part 2)

 

Indigenous health improvement

  • Putting Indigenous patients first: Lessons learned from improving the quality of nutrition care in a tertiary hospital in BC

  • Prenatal Opioid Exposure and Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome: A Collaborative Research Project with First Nations Communities

  • Identifying social determinants of health and quality of life information for use in health and social services in Indigenous communities

  • The Arthritis Community Learning Circle: A Learning Community Advancing Equitable Arthritis Care for Indigenous Peoples

  • Indigenous Knowledge Translation at the Indigenous Wellbeing Gathering Conference

 

Care and caregiving

  • Raise Your Voice: How to Increase the Effectiveness of Resident and Family Councils in Long-Term Care Homes in British Columbia, Canada.

  • Qualitatively Exploring Opportunities to Support Older Women’s Sexual Health and Wellbeing in Fraser Health Authority’s Assisted Living Sector

  • Understanding the lived experience of participating in exercise in youth with cerebral palsy and their caregivers

  • The effects of caregiving: setting up our research framework

  • Exploring perceptions on the concerns, challenges, and opportunities around sedentary behaviour awareness and reduction in long-term care homes

  • Beyond the Binary in BC: A Continuous, Collaborative, Commitment to Supporting Inclusive Women’s Health Research

  • Evidence-based Cost Accounting for Long-term Care Beds in Home-based and Institutional Settings (Work in Progress)

 

Improving infrastructures for patient and community engagement (Part 2)

  • Organizational Factors that Foster Engagement-Capable Environments: A Study of Health Research Networks

  • Peer-to-Peer as a Patient Partner Recruitment Strategy in a National Kidney Health Research Network

  • Collaborating with Patients to Create UBC Health’s Position Statement for Patient and Community Engagement in Research

  • A Patient and Family Cost Calculator called GEOFFE

  • Leading from the Edge: Rural Patients & Communities Advocating, Designing & Influencing Digital Patient Tools

  • Characterizing the impacts of engaging with patient advisory councils on long-term recovery for sepsis survivors and their families

  • Power and Perspectives: Using Equity Walk Throughs to Inform Equity-Oriented Approaches at BC Cancer Vancouver

Innovations in health care and health systems (Part 2)

  • Improving Patient Involvement through Human Centered Design

  • An analysis of client data by Open Arms Patient Advocacy’s learning community to improve healthcare accessibility and navigation in Alberta

  • A Day in the Life of a Longhauler: Amplifying Experiences of Long COVID Patients through Photovoice Methodology

  • Designing a patient-first virtual service

  • Peer support for people with traumatic brain injury within community-partnerships: a mixed-methods investigation of feasibility and impact

  • Conducting mixed-methods research with individuals with traumatic brain injury: Reflections and considerations

  • Co-Creating Care: Enhancing Advance Care Planning in Oncology Through Patient & Healthcare provider partnerships

What are learning communities?

 

Learning communities are groups of people with shared interests and goals, multiple perspectives, experiences, and expertise that meaningfully collaborate to solve health and health system problems.

 

Explore learning communities.

Are there opportunities to share my work?

 

Submissions are now closed. Successful teams have been notified.

 

Learn more about submissions.

This year, we were thrilled to receive over 90 submissions for the conference.

 

68 submissions met the eligibility criteria. A panel reviewed the 68 submissions and selected 55 to share as posters at the conference.

 

View submissions that met the eligibility criteria.

View the booklet of accepted abstracts.

Frequently asked questions (FAQ)

I want to watch the virtual livestream and will not attend in-person. Do I need to register?

No, registration is only required for in-person attendees.

 

The sessions in the Pinnacle Ballroom will be livestreamed. Watch the virtual livestream through this link: Putting Patients First 2024 livestream. The conference broadcast will start on November 14 at 8 a.m. PT.

Where will the conference take place?

Putting Patients First will be hosted in Vancouver, BC, at the Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown Hotel. If you plan to attend in-person, you must register.

 

Vancouver Marriott Pinnacle Downtown Hotel
1128 W Hastings St, Vancouver, BC
https://www.marriott.com/en-us/hotels/yvrdt-vancouver-marriott-pinnacle-downtown-hotel/overview/

 

Some of the conference sessions will be livestreamed. If you only plan to watch the livestream, you do not need to register. More information on virtual sessions will be available in the coming weeks.

Will the sessions be recorded?

Photography, audio or video recording will take place in all designated conference spaces.

 

If you do not wish to be included, please notify staff at the registration desk. A modified name tag and/or lanyard will be provided to those people who do not want to be recorded. Specific seating will also be provided in the main presentation room for people who do not want to be recorded. Read the full AV notice.

 

Some conference sessions will be recorded and made available following the event.

Will masks and hand sanitizers be provided at the event?

We are encouraging all attendees and staff to wear masks to protect themselves and others. Masks and hand sanitizers will be available at the check-in desk.

Is this a fragrance-free event?

Yes. Please refrain from wearing cologne, perfume or other scented products.

Where can I learn about previous years of PPF?

Contact us

  • Questions?

    no position

    ppf@healthresearchbc.ca

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