Department of Medicine members honored by VCH as the unsung heroes of the COVID-19 pandemic

On May 1st, 2020 we celebrated National Physician’s Day.  At Vancouver Coastal Health, three Department of Medicine members were nominated by their colleagues for being the unsung heroes in both challenging times such as the COVID-19 pandemic, but also whose actions throughout the year contribute to the overall health and well being of their patients, their peers and their communities.


Dr. Alissa Wright

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Dr. Alissa Wright is a Clinical Associate Professor at the University of British Columbia (UBC) within the Division of Infectious Disease. Her clinical responsibilities include the care of pre- and post-transplant patients at Vancouver General Hospital and St Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver. She is a consultant for BC Transplant on infectious disease issues in organ donors and BC Cancer for the care of Leukemia/BMT patients. Her research interests are in the area of infections and prevention of infectious complications for both solid organ and hematopoietic stem cell transplant recipients. She has been involved with the VCH Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee. More recently, she has been involved with the BC COVID-19 Therapeutics Committee which is focused on creating and updating provincial guidelines for treatment of COVID-19. She also been a co-investigator on two clinical trials for treatment or prevention COVID-19 at VCH in collaboration with her Infectious Disease colleagues.

 


Dr. Iain McCormick

 iain-mccormick2.pngDr. Iain McCormick has been a member of the UBC Division of General Internal Medicine since 2007. He was CTU director at VGH, and is currently the site lead for Internal Medicine at VGH. Dr. McCormick working with Dr. Shane Arishenkoff, CTU Director, and Dr. Andrew Kochan, Chief Medical Resident have been instrumental during this time in preparing their colleagues for taking care of patients with COVID 19 on the medical wards.

 

 

 


Dr. Shane Arishenkoff

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Dr. Shane Arishenkoff is a general internist and member of the UBC Division of General Internal Medicine. He completed his GIM fellowship at UBC and finished a one-year fellowship in Point of Care Ultrasound (PoCUS) at the University of California Irvine. His clinical work consists primarily as an Attending on the Clinical Teaching Unit (CTU) at Vancouver General Hospital (VGH). Dr. Arishenkoff is also the PoCUS lead for the Division, where his focus is on resident training, curriculum development, and research. As part of this work, he runs an ultrasound and procedures rotation that aims to provide dedicated PoCUS instruction and opportunities to perform several ultrasound guided procedures over the four-week rotation. He is the co-chair of the Canadian Internal Medicine Ultrasound (CIMUS) group and working on developing national standards for PoCUS education in internal medicine. Finally, Dr. Arishenkoff is the CTU director at VGH and sits on the Resident Training Committee as well as the VGH CTU Quality Improvement Committee. Working with Dr. Shane Arishenkoff, Dr. Iain McCormick General Internal Medicine Lead and Dr. Andrew Kochan, Chief Medical Resident have been instrumental during this time in preparing their colleagues for taking care of patients with COVID 19 on the medical wards.


This story originally appeared on VCH News