MONTREAL — Darren Entwistle, Telus president and CEO and a McGill alumnus, is donating $100,000 of his salary to support the work of researchers at the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC) studying the impact of virtual connections on hospitalized patients who are cut off from their families and friends during the Covid-19 pandemic, it was announced today.
As previously reported, Entwistle is donating three months of his salary to help support Canadian healthcare workers on the front lines battling Covid-19. He has chosen the MUHC Foundation as one of the donation recipients.
On June 5, MUHC researchers Dr. Inés Colmegna, rheumatologist, Dr. Amal Bessissow, internal medicine physician, and Dr. David Meger, computer scientist, began a pilot project to study the impact of virtual interactions on isolated hospitalized patients and the ways in which video connectivity may contribute to a decrease in negative emotions such as loneliness, depression, anxiety and fear — all known factors that can lead to poor health outcomes, says the MUHC Foundation’s news release.
“There are patients who have essentially been locked in their room for five weeks in solitary confinement,” said Dr. Don Sheppard, director of the McGill Interdisciplinary Initiative in Infection and Immunity (MI4), the group overseeing the research effort at the MUHC. “To reduce the risk of spreading the virus, nobody has been allowed to come and visit them. We saw clearly that this impacts their mental health, and quite likely their physical health, too.”
The research team’s endeavour is evaluating the impact of virtual calls on anxiety, social isolation, depression and perceived stress. Those primary outcomes will be tested with questionnaires specifically validated to verify those emotions. Among the variables collected as part of the study will be the number and duration of video calls as well as the number of contacts with whom a patient has communicated. The data gathered from this study will serve as a proof of concept to test interventions in similar situations or with other patient groups in future randomized clinical trials, says the release.
This project is one of more than 40 projects being led by MI4, Montreal’s leader in addressing the Covid-19 pandemic and mitigating risks for Canadians and the world. Drs. Colmegna and Bessissow expect to report on the preliminary results of their research as early as October.
“The MUHC is fortunate to have been selected as one of the Canadian institutions to benefit from this generous contribution,” notes MUHC Foundation chair Norman Steinberg, in the news release. “With this $100,000, researchers will examine and measure outcomes of this Covid-induced isolation and offer meaningful solutions to combat it.”
