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SickKids

Trauma Program

SickKids hospital workers standing on top of the emergency helicopter pad.

Who we are

The Trauma Program at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) is an accredited lead trauma hospital for paediatrics in Ontario. We are responsible for ensuring high level care for seriously injured children and youth, while providing leadership in the areas of trauma education, research and injury prevention. The program was established in 1989 with the mandate to provide quality patient care to trauma patients.

Program directors

Dr. Suzanne Beno

Medical Co-Director, Trauma Program

Headshot of Joshua Ramjist

Dr. Joshua Ramjist

Surgical Co-Director, Trauma Program

What we do

Our goal is to provide the best possible acute and rehabilitative trauma care for injured children, while continuing leadership in reducing childhood injury through strategic and collaborative prevention initiatives.

Education and training opportunities

The SickKids Trauma Fellowship is designed to build competency in paediatric trauma management and leadership. There are up to two trauma fellowships allowed per academic year, one through the division of General Surgery and one through the division of Paediatric Emergency Medicine. Although slightly different (see below), the Trauma Fellowship is one year in length. The Trauma Fellow is the Trauma Team Leader (TTL), providing comprehensive TTL care to injured children and youth from the initial point of contact through to admission and/or discharge.

The fellowship is primarily based at SickKids, with at least 1 month spent at an accredited adult trauma facility (typically at Sunnybrook Hospital or St. Michael’s Hospital) to gain further exposure and expertise. The fellowship can additionally be tailored to optimize a fellow’s exposure and experience in certain areas of interest, such as simulation, injury prevention etc.

Academic requirements for trauma fellows include leading quarterly interdisciplinary trauma rounds, attending the Trauma Program Management Committee meetings, preparing and discussing trauma morbidity and mortality rounds, helping facilitate simulation scenarios for team trauma training and engaging in a trauma-related quality improvement or research project.

The two trauma fellowship program directors are Dr. Suzanne Beno (Paediatric Emergency Medicine) and Dr. Joshua Ramjist (General Surgery).

During the fellowship, the fellow will work as a staff physician in the Emergency Department with a set requirement for clinical work based upon the current PEM advanced training requirements. A flexible schedule can be created, allowing for time away from SickKids, as well as maximal immersion in inpatient trauma management. This will be discussed with program directors prior to commencing the fellowship. Applicants must apply through the advanced fellowship in PEM stream and should contact Dr. Suzanne Beno for further information. Please visit the Education & Training section on the Emergency Medicine page for more details about the application process.

During the Fellowship, the Trauma Fellow will provide Senior Paediatric Surgical Resident coverage an average of five nights per month. They will be responsible for the management of the Paediatric Surgical in-service and consultations to inpatient units and emergency along with supervision of junior Paediatric Surgical Residents while on-call. Operative experience is primarily based on “on-call” exposure. Applicants should contact Dr. Joshua Ramjist for further information. Please visit the Education and training opportunities section on the General & Thoracic Surgery page for more details about the application process.

Resources and partners

CHIRPP is an injury and poisoning surveillance system that collects and analyzes data on injuries to people who are seen at the emergency rooms of 11 pediatric hospitals and 9 general hospitals in Canada. The CHIRPP is a unique, richly detailed database of “pre-event” injury information obtained by asking:

  • What was the injured person doing when the injury happened?
  • What went wrong?
  • Where did the injury occur?

SickKids has been a proud CHIRPP site since the early 1990s, and continues to collect and provide injury data for local and national surveillance.

Our team

Dr. Daniel Rosenfield — Physician Director
Deborah Taylor — Manager
Evangeline Zhang — Coordinator

Parachute is a national, charitable organization, formed in July 2012, which unites the former organizations of Safe Communities Canada, Safe Kids Canada, SMARTRISK and ThinkFirst Canada in to one strong leader in injury prevention. Ultimately, a new organization with the new brand Parachute was created that combines the expertise and experience of all four legacy organizations and is designed to achieve greater impact in awareness, advocacy and action in the cause of injury prevention. SickKids has a longstanding relationship with Parachute, and the two organizations frequently collaborate on injury prevention and harm reduction programs.

The Canadian Paediatric Society (CPS) is the national association of paediatricians, committed to working together to advance the health of children and youth by nurturing excellence in health care, advocacy, education, research and support of its membership. SickKids and the CPS share many common goals, and work extremely close together to advance paediatric health. Many SickKids staff are actively involved in the CPS, from helping draft and disseminate position statements to engaging in injury prevention research.

The Safety and the Environment Learning Hub provides information for parents about indoor and outdoor safety such as scald prevention and how to prevent head injuries in children. There are also resources discussing car and travel safety, and poison prevention. Also find first aid resources including information about animal bites, insect bites and sunburns.

AboutKidsHealth is a health education resource for children, youth and caregivers that is approved by health-care providers at The Hospital for Sick Children. AboutKidsHealth empowers families to become a partner in their own health care by equipping them with reliable, evidence-based health information. It makes complex health information easy to understand for families, and makes it immediately available whenever and wherever they have questions about child health regardless of where they are in Canada or the world.

At Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, we care for kids with disabilities, kids needing rehabilitation after illness or trauma, kids whose medical complexity requires a kind of care they can’t get elsewhere. Every day, Holland Bloorview’s frontline staff embrace kids with boundless potential and their families and ask “how can we help you achieve your goals?” With a mix of services not offered anywhere else in Ontario, we partner to provide the best interprofessional care within our walls and to prepare families for life beyond them. Through teaching and research, we expand how the best care is defined and take those new insights around the globe.

The Trauma Association of Canada is committed to reduce the incidence and relieve the burden of injury by bringing together a community of multidisciplinary trauma professionals involved in the care of the injured patient to:

  • Improve the quality of injury care through the promotion of the highest standard of inter-professional professional practice
  • Provide education for its members at the local, regional and national level
  • Promote basic science and clinical trauma research through the dissemination of research findings
  • Establish, maintain & update trauma standards and create awareness of best practices by promoting interdisciplinary partnerships
  • Advocate for and participate with key stakeholders in national injury surveillance and quality bench-marking
  • Facilitate and participate in public education on injury prevention
  • Participate in community disaster response planning
  • Advocate to governments to implement legislation designed to reduce the incidence of injury
  • Enable strong relationships with key stakeholders and build coalitions with key partners in trauma care and injury

The Pediatric Trauma Society (PTS) is a professional organization for all health-care providers interested in improving outcomes for injured children through development of optimal care guidelines, education research and advocacy. PTS is the product of the collaborative vision of many pediatric trauma healthcare providers from around the world. Filling a void, PTS is working toward becoming the resource for both pediatric and adult trauma care providers to improve pediatric trauma care regardless of where injured children are cared for.

The American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma (ACS COT) has been dedicated to improving the quality of care for injured patients for more than 80 years. Since 2014, the Trauma Quality Improvement Program (TQIP) has continued this focus on improving quality care by providing validated, risk-adjusted benchmarking for paediatric trauma centers. The risk-adjusted data, combined with training and collaboration with other TQIP participants, allows TQIP participants to track outcomes and improve patient care.

Injury prevention

Injury is the leading cause of death in Canadian children, and SickKids sees over 900 injured patients each year. To help reduce the number of seriously injured children, SickKids provides injury prevention support and programming within the hospital and community.

Find more information using the hashtag #SKInjuryPrevention across social media for current events and details!

For Injury Prevention tips visit the AboutKidsHealth Injury Prevention Learning Hub!

Contact:

Emma Schmidt, Injury Prevention Specialist 
emma.schmidt@sickkids.ca

The Toronto Helmet Initiative is a group of not-for-profit organizations, dedicated to promoting the proper use of bike helmets. Our goal is to reduce head injuries from cycling by encouraging people to wear a properly fitted helmet.

Contact the Trauma Program

Dr. Suzanne Beno
Medical Co-Director, Trauma Program, Division of Emergency Medicine
Email: suzanne.beno@sickkids.ca

Dr. Joshua Ramjist
Surgical Co-Director, Trauma Program, Division of General and Thoracic Surgery
Email: joshua.ramjist@sickkids.ca

Sheila Rowed
Clinical Manager, Trauma Program
Email: sheila.rowed@sickkids.ca

Johanna Crudden
Administrative Coordinator, Trauma Program
Email: johanna.crudden@sickkids.ca

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