Memories from the Pride of Nova Scotia

Ben Smith, M.D.
Nadia Murphy, M.D.
CORA Co-Presidents 2006-2007

Greetings from Nova Scotia!

This year we had another great CORA meeting ending off a very successful year. Beginning in the Fall, we assembled the results from the second Canadian residents survey; these results were circulated to the various CORA representatives and allowed all of the residents to see the differences and similarities between the various programmes across the country. Hopefully this will enable us to lobby for change in any programmes that are significantly behind the others and standardize orthopaedic training across the country.

The COA Mid-Winter meeting went very smoothly this year; after the previous year's Board decision to waive the COA annual membership dues and Annual Meeting registration fees for residents and fellows. We presented the budget and reviewed CORA business to bring the COA Board up to date on the plans for the current year's meeting. We also represented the resident voice on several issues including industry sponsorship and funding.

Delegates at the 2007 CORA Annual Meeting

The 33^rd Annual CORA Meeting was held in Halifax in conjunction with the COA and was a resounding success. The combination of CORA and COA continues to work well, allowing residents to attend both meetings while decreasing transportation and accommodation costs. It also allows for increased corporate sponsorship and decreases the organizational challenges of planning a national meeting. Both conferences were very well attended and received rave reviews. Ninety-four residents attended the CORA meeting this year representing all 16 training programs across the country.  A first since 2003.

The CORA research presentations went very smoothly this year with 20 podium presentations highlighting some of the best research being performed across the country. The quality of the presentations was outstanding and proved that even during a busy residency, important research could still be done and residents were making significant contributions to orthopaedic understanding.

Dr. Danny Goel from the University of Calgary was awarded third prize for his paper: "Deep Vein Thrombosis Prophylaxis in Distal Lower Extremity Fractures - A Prospective Randomized Controlled Trial". Dr. Alexander Rabinovich from McMaster won second prize for his paper: "Protease Activity in the Stromal Cells of Giant Cell Tumour of Bone". Dr. Isaac Moss from the University of Toronto took home the top prize this year for the best paper presented in the CORA programme.  His abstract: "A Novel Composite Elastin and Hyaluronan Scaffold for Nucleus Pulposus Tissue Engineering" along with the other award winners are published at the end of this article.

One of the highlights of the day was the hands-on demonstrations held over the lunch hour. With the generous assistance of Smith & Nephew, Synthes, and DePuy Medical Products, we were able to see and work with some of the new products and techniques available. We have always believed that we can learn more when we physically try a new procedure and it was great to see both the residents and some of the attending staff out working with the drills and nails!

Participants of the hands-on workshops

Next year's meeting will be held on June 4 in Quebec City. The American Orthopaedic Association (AOA)'s Resident Leadership Forum (RLF) will also be held that same day so we are currently examining the possibility of combining some activities with our colleagues from the U.S. In addition to planning the next meeting, a new and updated iteration of the resident survey will be collected and sent out. We are also trying to assemble an online fellowship database listing the names and fellowships of our recent graduates. This would allow us to contact these new fellows in the various programmes and sub-specialties and ask them about their experience and any recommendations.

We would like to thank the COA and CORA as a whole for allowing us to be the Co-Presidents for this year. It has been a pleasure and a privilege to serve and we have had a lot of fun. We would like to take the opportunity to thank Mr. Doug Thomson, Dr. Brendan D. Lewis and Ms. Cynthia Vezina for their tremendous support and encouragement. They guided us through this year and we could not have done it without them. Thank you for an amazing experience and we wish you all the best in the future!

Drs. Nadia Murphy and Ben Smith