Season’s greetings to all MDRAO members. It’s hard to believe that Christmas is already around the corner! Many hospitals are busy at this time of the year, and this always has an impact on the MDR departments with extra work related to more surgeries and procedures that are being done.

The MDRAO Executive Provincial board members have also been busy lately. I am proud of all the work that the Executive board has done. I want to especially thank Stacey Gielen from the Sigma chapter as well as Maria Raj and Pablo Ramiro for helping organize and hold mini conferences in their respective chapter. Both events were successful with very positive feedback from the attendees. After almost two years of inactivity, these events were certainly welcomed by everyone. Our past president, Jeffrey Phelps, was also seen attending both events. We greatly appreciate his involvement in these events.

The Executive Provincial board members also did a lot of mingling and promotion at the last CAMDR conference, which was held in Laval, QC on the second week of October. MDRAO had a booth at the event. We were able to promote our online course, recertification test and our English and French book and workbook. Our Executive Director, Ryan Arcan, was able to meet many vendors and start promoting our 2023 conference. We are very excited about our upcoming conference; we do not have a specific date yet as we are still in the process of securing a venue. One thing is certain: The conference will be held in Toronto, and it will be great!

The Executive Provincial board met in person in Toronto on the weekend of December 3rd and 4th; this was our last meeting of the year. MDRAO is still doing very well with the online course and recertification exam as well as the book sale. We are also working with the City of Waterloo on a new initiative to recruit and train new immigrants to work in the MDR departments of the surrounding regions. Tamiza Samji from the Delta chapter is working with Lisa Anstey, Manager of Medical Device Reprocessing Department of Grand River Hospital on this initiative. 

The Executive Provincial board also hired Becker Associates to organize the 2023 conference. Becker Associates did a great job on organizing the 2022 MDRAO conference. They only had a couple months to plan the whole thing, and the result was amazing!

I am proud of all that we accomplished in 2022. I want to personally thank the Executive Provincial board members, our Executive Director, and our Management company (Becker Associates) for the great work they do and their dedication to MDRAO. I also want to thank the Chapter Executives for their work—we could not do it without you.

Wishing all of you Happy Holidays!

Nathalie Legault
MDRAO President