Victoria is a clinical research coordinator and the inaugural Fracture Prevention Program Coordinator at St. Michael's Hospital, since 2002, and a Program Consultant for Osteoporosis Canada, Fracture Screening and Prevention Program, since 2006. Their multidisciplinary inpatient and outpatient program ensures all low trauma fracture patients receive appropriate investigation and treatment to lower their risk of future fracture. In addition to managing the day to day operations of their program, she teaches and supports orthopaedic residents on post fracture care during their residency at the University of Toronto. They also teach other interested groups on how to develop their own post fracture program and have worked with people from all over the globe and helped with the development of programs across Canada. Database development, management, data input, cleaning and analysis are also daily activities in their program in addition to working with their REB, writing articles for publication, abstracts, developing posters for presentations, and participating in other studies at their hospital in post fracture care. She has a MSc in Rehabilitation Science from the University of Toronto. With 2 book chapters and author on 24 peer reviewed publications in the field of Post Fracture Care with the team at St. Michael's Hospital and Osteoporosis Canada, she has also presented posters and oral presentations at provincial, national and international meetings on post fracture care.
Julie A. Switzer, MD, FAOA, FAAOS, is a board-certified orthopaedic surgeon with specialization in geriatric orthopaedics. Dr. Switzer served as Co-Chair for the AAOS Clinical Practice Guideline Workgroup on Hip Fractures in Elderly Patients and is a founding member and Immediate Past-President of the International Geriatric Fracture Society (IGFS)- US Chapter Fragility Fracture Network (FFN).
Dr. Switzer has spent the majority of her 20 year orthopaedic career dedicated to establishing and leading an interdisciplinary, protocol-driven Geriatric Fracture Care program, with a primary career goal to make a substantive difference in the field of geriatric orthopaedics. This is accomplished through a focus on: enhancing care for older fracture patients in the perioperative period; preventing subsequent fractures in elderly fracture patients; and working with vulnerable populations of elders with musculoskeletal problems. Dr. Switzer has also been involved in 59 national and international presentations, and has over 70 publications in the field of fracture care in the elderly.
Dr. Emily Wagstrom is an orthopaedic traumatologist at Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis, MN. She is the current Director of Orthopaedic Trauma. She serves as the Co-Director of the Orthopaedic Trauma Fellowship at HCMC and Co-Site Director for the University of Minnesota Orthopaedic Surgery Residency. Dr. Wagstrom completed her undergraduate degree in Exercise Science at the University of Iowa. She graduated from the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine and completed her orthopaedic surgery residency at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics. After finishing her residency, she completed an Orthopaedic Trauma Fellowship at Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis, MN. She has been on staff at HCMC since 2016.
Dr. Dykes is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Director of Research for the Center for Patient Safety, Research, and Practice at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. She is a leader in the field of patient safety informatics and her research focuses on leveraging health information technology to enhance patient safety outcomes. Her work has contributed to the understanding of the physical and economic costs of patient falls and the role of patient and family engagement in prevention. Dr. Dykes is MPI of a PCORI funded project that aims to improve post fracture care of older adults with osteoporosis as they transition to skilled nursing rehab and back to the community.
Dr. Dykes is author of 2 books, over 190 peer reviewed publications, and has presented her work nationally and internationally. She is past President and Board Chair of the American Medical Informatics Association, an elected fellow of American Academy of Nursing, the American College of Medical Informatics, and the International Academy of Health Sciences Informatics.
Dr. Earl Bogoch is a Professor of Surgery at the University of Toronto and Chair of the Department of Surgery Senior Academic Promotions Committee. Since 1995 he has worked on identifying high risk, ‘first fragility fracture’ patients for preventive interventions to protect against subsequent severe hip and vertebral fractures. Collaborating with scientists and program designers in Canada and internationally he has published extensively on this subject, focused on improving fracture prevention programs.
It started with a small QI project at Wellesley Hospital in the mid-90s, growing into a team he built at St. Michael's Hospital that included scientists, clinicians and program managers. Together in 2002 they created a novel, data-based fracture liaison service model based in the St Mike’s fracture clinic and orthopaedic ward. His team collaborated with Osteoporosis Canada and the Ontario Ministry of Health to help establish and iteratively improve the province-wide Ontario Fracture Screening and Prevention Program which has amassed a 120,000-patient database since 2007. To support the team’s work they have been awarded an annual evaluation grant from Ontario Ministry of Health for the past 17 years.
With colleagues, he published more than 70 peer-reviewed research publications on improving delivery of fracture prevention programs, and has an international profile in this field. He was an early executive committee member of FFN and was recognized, among other awards, with the Presidential Lifetime Award of the Canadian Orthopaedic Association.
In 2020, after advocacy by Dr. Bogoch to create a University Chair, Brookfield Partners Foundation came forward with a $3M grant. As the inaugural holder of the Brookfield Chair in Fracture Prevention, Dr. Bogoch has been able to fund new FLS sites across Canada, which now has FLS in 8/10 provinces and one of three northern territories. He continues to work closely with Osteoporosis Canada advancing shared goals of fracture prevention.
Dr. Danila is a Professor of Medicine in the Department of Medicine, Division of Clinical Immunology and Rheumatology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she serves as Associate Division Director for Clinical Research. She also holds an appointment as Physician Scientist with the Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center, Birmingham VA Medical Center, Birmingham, AL. Dr. Danila is an implementation scientist and health services researcher focused on decreasing health inequities and improving the quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of medical care. Her research program focuses on: i) the design and evaluation of complex behavioral interventions to improve outcomes for patients living with chronic conditions including osteoporosis and autoimmune and inflammatory rheumatic conditions; ii) re-designing healthcare services and leveraging technology (e.g., whole genome sequencing, telehealth, thermal imaging) in clinical practice; iii) developing a robust infrastructure for translational immunology and rheumatology research. Dr. Danila is multi-PI on the PCORI-funded Reducing Future Fractures and Improving Outcomes of Fragility Fracture -- the RESTORE Study, a pragmatic randomized clinical trial that will compare two different strategies to decrease the risk of subsequent fracture after a fragility fracture. Dr. Danila has been actively involved as volunteer for the American College of Rheumatology (ACR). She served on the ACR Insurance Subcommittee (ISC) from 2012-2016 and as a member of the ACR Committee on Quality of Care from 2018-2021. She currently serves on the Scientific Advisory Council for the Rheumatology Research Foundation and is an Associate Editor for the Arthritis Care and Research journal of the ACR.
Dr. Emil Schemitsch is Chair of the Department of Surgery, Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, Western University and Head of the Department of Surgery for London Health Sciences Centre and St. Joseph’s Health Care London. A University of Toronto graduate in Medicine, Dr. Schemitsch completed his orthopaedic training at the University of Toronto. To broaden his clinical exposure, he trained at the University of Washington (Harborview Medical Center) and Harvard University. His basic research interests include the systemic response to trauma, cell therapies, biomechanics, bone substitutes and the stimulation of fracture healing. His clinical research interests include computer assisted surgery, clinical trials, and outcomes studies in upper and lower extremity trauma and joint replacement.
Dr. Schemitsch has received international recognition for his research efforts including the Edouard J. Samson Award, the Founder’s Medal for Research from the CORS, a Kappa Delta Award from the AAOS, the Bovill Award from the OTA, the Neer Award from the ASES, the Best Paper Award from the International Society for Fracture Repair, the North American traveling fellowship and the ABC traveling fellowship. Dr. Schemitsch is the current President of the Orthopaedic Trauma Association (OTA), Past-President of the Canadian Orthopaedic Association (COA), and Past-President of the Canadian Arthroplasty Society (CAS). Dr. Schemitsch is the Editor-in-Chief for OTA International. Dr. Schemitsch has been a senior member of the Canadian Orthopaedic Trauma Society and his program of research in musculoskeletal trauma and arthritis has led to more than 650 publications in top journals.
Denise L. Orwig, Ph.D., is Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health and Director of the Baltimore Hip Studies at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. She also directs the MS in Gerontology Program. Dr. Orwig is a fellow in the Gerontological Society of America.
Dr. Orwig graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a dual Bachelor of Science degree in Business and Psychology. She earned a Master of Science degree in Applied Behavioral Science from the Johns Hopkins University and a doctoral degree in Biobehavioral Health and Gerontology from the Pennsylvania State University. Dr. Orwig began her academic career at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and has been there 26 years.
Dr. Orwig’s primary research has focused on areas of hip fracture recovery, intervention trials, and longitudinal research methods for conducting epidemiological studies of older adults. She directs the Baltimore Hip Studies (BHS) research program which is made up of a large interdisciplinary research team and she has established a network of 29 hospitals in the greater Baltimore area for hip fracture research that is the largest of its kind in the world. She has led eight cohort studies including more than 4,000 hip fracture patients, and four randomized trials. The BHS provides a unique infrastructure for producing significant manuscripts, collaborations with investigators both inside and outside the institution, sustaining a successful portfolio of NIA and PCORI funding since 1983, and training new scholars to be independent researchers. Many of the papers from the BHS serve as the impetus for recent intervention trials and current drug development in hip fracture patients. As a result of her leadership, the BHS has gained an international reputation for its ability to successfully conduct research studies with frail older populations.
Dr. Orwig has published 120 papers, including co-authoring the chapter on Hip Fractures in the recent addition of Hazzard’s Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology textbook.
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