I am truly honored and excited to welcome all of you to attend the 2018 Canadian Burn Conference. This conference now represents a major milestone in the development towards a Canadian Burn Association and a Canadian Burn Conference. With this meeting, we aim to found the Canadian Burn Association, which subsequently will hold and will be responsible for the annual meeting of the Canadian Burn Conference. This will allow all Canadian burn care providers enable everybody to meet on a regular basis and have successful interactions about specific questions, concerns, studies or any other relevant topic about Canadian burn patients in the true “burn spirit” of multi-disciplinary teams. This will also enable us to come together as a country and be prepared for unforeseen circumstances, such as mass casualties or natural catastrophes. This meeting will allow us develop nation-wide protocols and conduct nation-wide studies, which will address essential questions that are specific to Canadian burn patients or patients with complex wounds. This will hopefully lead to an improved and organized outcome.
This meeting derives from a symposium, held at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre several years ago and the response has been from the beginning, tremendous and incredible. Back then, we expected 75 people and in fact, over 100 people attended, to now reaching a high with our meeting in Vancouver in 2016, with significantly more than 200 attendees. We will hopefully reach the milestone of having over 300 attendees on a consistent basis.
This is also the first time that the Canadian Association of Burn Nurses who transitioned to join the Canadian Burn Association will be integrated in this meeting. I would therefore like to especially welcome our Canadian burn nurses to this meeting that also now will now serve as the umbrella for this team.
We selected a new venue in Toronto and we hope that you will enjoy this venue and the location, as well as the facilities and the culinary aspect that this location has to offer. Our social gathering will be at the Hockey Hall of Fame, which we believe is a true reflection of Canadian spirit and sport, and hopefully this spirit will translate to our conference to make important strides to improve Canadian burn care and care for patients with large and complex wounds.
Again, with heartfelt gratitude, thank you and a big welcome.
Program Director
Marc Jeschke MD, PhD, FACS, FCCM, FRCS(C)
Professor of Surgery,
Division of Plastic Surgery
Department of Immunology,
University of Toronto
Director Ross Tilley Burn Centre
Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre
Chair in Burn Research
Senior Scientist, Sunnybrook Research Institute
