$1.3 million donation from Quebec Firefighters Foundation for Major Burn Victims
Mr. Claude Lebrun, board chair of the Quebec Firefighters Foundation for Major Burn Victims; Dr. Jacques Turgeon, director of the CHUM research centre; Mr. Ékram Antoine Rabbat, president and chief executive officer of the Fondation du CHUM; Dr. Alexis Armour, researcher, burn care plastic surgery specialist at the CHUM and director of the Centre d’expertise pour les personnes victimes de brûlures graves de l’ouest du Québec; Mr. Gilles Dulude, board chair of the Fondation du CHUM; Mrs. Sylvie Tremblay, executive manager of the Quebec Firefighters Foundation for Major Burn Victims, Mr. Serge LeBlanc, executive director (Interim) of the CHUM
December 3, 2009 – Yesterday the Fondation du CHUM unveiled a plaque that will be installed at the Centre des grands brûlés du CHUM (CHUM Burn Centre) to mark a significant contribution from the Quebec Firefighters Foundation for Major Burn Victims. Over the past ten years, the Firefighters Foundation has donated $1.3 million to support care and research to improve treatment and quality of life for serious burn victims.
Research
Eighty per cent of the Firefighters Foundation donations support research. The research projects deal with different areas of specialty, such as the clinical applications of cultivated skin, expanding knowledge of scar treatment, immunological changes after serious burns, and specific psychological treatment for burn survivors.
Care
Support from the Firefighters Foundation has also helped improve the level of care by meeting the urgent needs of the CHUM Burn Centre. For example, the Centre has been able to build an admissions room with the equipment needed to provide immediate care to patients on arrival, such as catheter installation, wound debridement and cardiac monitoring.
The CHUM Burn Centre
Some 150 people are admitted every year to the CHUM Burn Centre which, as the designated centre for Western Quebec, serves 65% of the province’s population. In partnership with Villa Medica and the Association Entraide Grands Brûlés, it was accredited as the centre of expertise for serious burn victims in Western Quebec in 2004 by the Health and Social Services Ministry. Residents studying plastic surgery, intensive care and anaesthesiology train at the centre, acquiring a practical, first-hand vision of the problems that arise for this kind of patient.