Cornwall Community Hospital Welcomes New Doctors
September 9, 2019Cornwall Ontario – It has been 15 years of continuing improvement since the Cornwall Community Hospital was created, and during that time there has been a lot accomplished including the amalgamation of two campuses into one modern health care facility.
In addition to the completion of a $112 million redevelopment project in 2014 and subsequent and continual improvements in equipment, the Hospital has recently welcomed new medical professionals.
The hospital now has all shifts covered in the Emergency Department with the recruitment of 5 new physicians; Dr. Andrew Jacques is from Ottawa and Dr. Keir Maharaj, Dr. Mahood Hasan, Dr. Olivier Saleh and Dr. Nathalie Codsi, all from Montreal. These doctors have the additional Emergency Department specialization training.
The Cornwall Hospital Foundation’s “Adopt a Medical Resident” program has welcomed it’s first two students; Dr. Michael Heseltine, and Dr. Brittany Aziz. They are gaining the experience required under the Emergency Department specialization, and will then be committed to CCH and the community for an additional 2 years.
The Cornwall Community Hospital works with the City’s Economic Development Department on a number of recruitment strategies. They include attending fairs, posting vacancies in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, reaching out to medical schools and utilizing Health Force Ontario (a provincial marketing and recruitment agency that contributes to the planning, recruitment, retention, transition, and distribution of health practitioners in Ontario). These efforts have recently yielded 10 new physicians to CCH:
• Dr. Leslie Stephens, a general surgeon from London Ontario, has relocated to the area and is now part of the Cumberland Clinic.
• Dr. Reina Yao, an orthopaedic surgeon, comes to Cornwall after being in Vancouver and London Ontario.
• Dr. Katie Lepage, came to CCH during her residency training and is now back as a hospitalist.
• Dr. Dale Peffer, a hospitalist, is relocating from Saskatoon.
• Dr. Hooman Ghomeshi, an anaesthetist from Strathroy, Ontario. Dr. Ghomeshi also works in the Emergency Department
• Dr. Sanjai Dayal, a psychiatrist from Prince Edward Island.
• Dr. Dr. Antonio DiCintio, a new grad from Ottawa now working as a hospitalist and family physician
• Dr. Maryam Yazdan is a new psychiatry graduate from Sherbrooke University
• Dr. MacArinze Ojiaku, is a new radiologist graduate from the University of Ottawa. He also did a fellowship in abdominal imaging and intervention at Harvard University in Boston
• Dr. Nima Mohammad-Shahi, an ophthalmologist currently in Boston will be joining CCH in November
Medical Recruitment and Scholarship
Cornwall Economic Development continues to partner with the Cornwall Community Hospital in a joint effort to recruit medical professionals to Cornwall. Activities include marketing Cornwall to existing or recently graduated medical professionals.at various opportunities across Ontario. Interested doctors can apply for assistance to offset the costs of establishing their offices in Cornwall.
A medical scholarship is also available to qualified medical students. The medical scholarship is valued at $25,000 annually and may be awarded, each year, for up to six years. In order to be eligible, candidates must be a resident of Cornwall or SDG and must be accepted or currently enrolled in full-time studies in a Faculty of Medicine in Canada with the intent of becoming qualified to practice Family Medicine in Ontario. In return for scholarship funding, the recipient will set up a family practice and undertake admitting hospital privileges in Cornwall for a minimum period of five years.
About the Cornwall Community Hospital
The Cornwall Community Hospital has historical roots that reach back beyond Confederation to 1897. Cornwall Community Hospital was incorporated in 2004 with the amalgamation of the Cornwall General Hospital and the Hotel Dieu Hospital, both with over 100 years of health care service to Cornwall and surrounding area. With the completion of a major redevelopment project in 2014, and the construction the Addiction and Mental Health Centre at the end of 2016, the hospital consolidated all acute care and community based services on the McConnell avenue site. Having everything on one campus positions the hospital well to serve its community for many years to come.