2024 Honour Award Recipients

Gold Medal

Dr J. Adam Law

Halifax, Nova Scotia

A practising anesthesiologist since 1994, Dr. Law’s academic interest lies with airway management. He is proud to have co-developed the AIME airway management courses with emergency physician Dr. George Kovacs:  a good example of cross-specialty cooperation. He continues to co-direct and teach these courses, recently expanded to include lightly embalmed human cadavers to help enhance skills in crucial airway management techniques, including awake tracheal intubation.  He has also taught the Anesthesia version of the US-based Difficult Airway Course since its inception and until recently, served as its course director.    

Dr. Law chaired the Canadian Airway Focus Group for two iterations of developing evidence- and consensus-based airway management guidelines. With the help of a dedicated group of clinicians from across the country, these were published in the Canadian Journal of Anesthesia in 2013 and 2021.  He is also an executive member of the multinational Project for Universal Management of Airways (PUMA), contributing to their efforts to develop universally applicable airway management guidelines.  

Dr. Law co-edited the text “Airway Management in Emergencies”, currently in its third edition, now as an open-access online text. He has also contributed to other airway management textbooks in the roles of co-editor and chapter author. He has authored or co-authored numerous published journal articles, including peer-reviewed original research as well as editorials. He continues to teach and speak on airway management inside and outside North America.   

The Gold Medal is the highest award of the Canadian Anesthesiologists’ Society. It is an inscribed medal given in recognition of excellence in a career in service to anesthesiology. 
 

Clinical Practitioner Award

Dr John Bowering

Vancouver, British Columbia

Dr. John Bowering is recognized for his clinical expertise in cardiovascular anesthesia and intraoperative transesophageal echocardiography. He has practiced for over 30 years both in the operating room and the Cardiac Surgical ICU (CSICU) where he has a special interest caring for heart transplantation patients as well as those requiring mechanical circulatory support. He was part of a small team that helped initiate the heart transplantation program at St. Paul's Hospital. 

Dr. Bowering has always had an interest in resident and fellow education. He established a fellowship program in cardiac anesthesia which has continued to evolve over the past 25 years. In addition, he has been the recipient of more than 15 teaching awards and was on the Royal College oral exam board.  

From an administrative perspective he was the UBC head of cardiac anesthesia and Director of the CSICU at SPH. Dr. Bowering remains active in clinical practice today. 

Given in recognition of excellence in clinical anesthesia practice. 

Clinical Teacher Award

Dr Mark Hynes

Ottawa, Ontario

Dr. Hynes was born in Scotland but immigrated to Canada as a child with his family.  He grew in Nova Scotia and obtained a B.Sc. in Chemistry from Acadia University.  He obtained his MD from McGill University in 1985 and then did a rotating internship at the Regina General Hospital.  He completed his residency in anesthesia at McGill University in 1990 and then did a fellowship in cardiac anesthesia with Dr. Earl Wynands at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute.  He worked at the New Brunswick Heart Centre for five years during which he took time off to get formal training in echocardiography at Ste. Boniface Hospital in Winnipeg and at the Ottawa Heart Institute.  He returned to the Ottawa Heart Institute in 1996 where he is a full-time cardiac anesthesiologist.  He was the Director of Perioperative TEE for many years and is the lead procedural echocardiographer in the Heart Institute’s structural heart program.  His interests are in surgical and catheter-based treatments of valvular and structural heart disease.  

Given in recognition of excellence in the teaching of clinical anesthesia.

John Bradley Young Educator Award

Dr Anton Chau

Vancouver, British Columbia

Dr. Anton Chau is a Clinician-Scientist and Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Anesthesiology, Pharmacology & Therapeutics at the University of British Columbia. Since his initial appointment, Dr. Chau has made significant contributions to advancing the clinical and research education of fellows, residents, and students in anesthesia. 

Dr. Chau is passionate about teaching obstetric anesthesia in his clinical practice and consistently earns exceptional ratings as a teacher who challenges his trainees to engage in critical thinking and reasoning. He also cultivated confidence and competence in the critical appraisal of literature and quantitative methods among anesthesia residents while serving as the former UBC Anesthesia Journal Club Director. Dr. Chau is a five-time recipient of the UBC Anesthesiology Residency Program Master Teacher Award for teaching excellence. Furthermore, his commitment to mentoring Family Practice Anesthesia residents as they transition to full independent practice has earned him the UBC Family Practice Anesthesia Program Outstanding Teacher award. 

During his seven-year tenure as the Fellowship and Research Director at BC Women’s Hospital from 2016-2023, Dr. Chau spearheaded the development and implementation of a clinical and research curriculum in obstetric anesthesia. To date, Dr. Chau has trained and mentored over 40 anesthesia fellows, residents, and students. His outstanding mentorship was acknowledged with the BC Children’s and Women’s Medical Staff Association Mentor/Educator of the Year Award in 2018. That same year, he was nominated for the Society for Obstetric Anesthesiology and Perinatology Teacher of the Year Award. 

At present, Dr. Chau serves as the Competency Chair for the UBC Clinician-Investigator Program and hopes to inspire medical students as well as residents from all Canadian Royal College residency programs to pursue and sustain careers as clinician-scientists. Within CAS, he currently holds the position of secretary-treasurer for the CAS Obstetric Anesthesia Section and serves as Vice-Chair for the Clinical Practice Guidelines Committee. 

Given in recognition of excellence and effectiveness in education in anesthesia.

 

Humanitarian Award

Dr Wesley Rajaleelan

Ottawa, Ontario

Dr Wesley Rajaleelan is currently a staff anesthesiologist at The Ottawa Hospital (TOH) with a faculty appointment as an Assistant Professor at the University of Ottawa, Faculty of Medicine. He sits on the ACUDA board as the global & rural health representative from the University of Ottawa and is a member-at-large of the GSOGAC (The global surgery, OBGYN, Anesthesiology committee of The Ottawa Hospital). He also serves as the interim Director and the fellowship lead for Global Health at the uOttawa-DAPM. 

Having extensively worked with the MSF on field missions, his primary interests focus on global health equity and humanitarian aid. His journey with MSF began with a passion for leveraging his clinical training to enhance humanitarian efforts in austere environments and places of need. He first met a 5-year-old child with NOMA disease in West Nigeria in 2016, when on a surgical mission with the MSF and has been involved with NOMA humanitarian clinical practice and advocacy ever since. Inspired by Dr Jane Heggie, he put in his application and now he's part of the volunteer pool of staff specialists of the ICRC, awaiting his onboarding mission.  

As the interim director of global health, at the Ottawa DAPM, his work involves organising virtual teaching rounds for the residents of KCMC, Tanzania and to aid them to find resources for their research methodology and teaching, partnered with the faculty of medicine from uOttawa, in addition to organising bidirectional faculty mobility and resident electives. He was recently appointed as the co-lead on CASIEF’s educational mission to Ethiopia. 

He also serves as the vice chair of the Archives & Artifacts committee and a member of the Annual Meeting Scientific Program Committee and the scientific abstracts committee of the CAS.  

Given in recognition of excellence in global anesthesiology.

 

CAS Outstanding Volunteer Award

Dr Vivian Ip

Calgary, Alberta

Dr. Vivian Ip is a Clinical Professor at the University of Calgary, Alberta. She is a practicing anesthesiologist with fellowship training in Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine, and Ambulatory anesthesia.  At the South Health Campus Hospital in Calgary, she is the Director of Regional Anesthesia and Acute Pain Medicine Fellowship Program.  

While continuing her full clinical commitment and her leadership roles at her local institution without local administrative support, she has given up her own time to commit to volunteering for the societies that she belongs to. At the Canadian Anesthesiologists’ Society (CAS), she is the Vice Chair of the Regional Anesthesia Section and the Chair of the Environmental Sustainability Section. She is also the CAS representative on the Sustainability Committee at the World Federation of Societies of Anesthesiologists. At the American Society of Regional Anesthesia (ASRA) Pain Medicine, she is the Chair of the Newsletter Committee and the Chair of the Green Anesthesia Special Interest Group. These leadership roles enable strong collaboration to be established between the societies, sharing knowledge and encouraging networking opportunities across the globe. The education events that she was involved in planning include the ‘Environmental sustainability and your practice’ full day symposium which she Chaired, as well as the annual Earth Day celebration events and webinars.  Another collaborative effort is the newsletter exchange and collaboration between the CAS Regional Anesthesia Section and the ASRA Pain Medicine.  She also participated at the international collaboration education event on the 1st World Day of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine.  

Along with these volunteering roles, she also serves as a member of the Editorial Board at the Canadian Journal of Anesthesia (CJA), and she is an Editor for the journal, Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine (RAPM). In addition, she is active in research and continues to publish at peer-reviewed journals, her research interests include regional nerve block catheters, environmental sustainability in the perioperative arena, neuromodulation in acute pain, and nerve block safety. 

This award is given in recognition of excellence in supporting CAS through volunteering and is awarded to a CAS member who has made a significant and sustained contribution to the Society and has helped improve its image as a volunteer.