Laurie Bourne

#IamMGH – Meet Laurie Bourne

#IamMGH tells the stories of our people. Meet Laurie Bourne, Director of Quality, Operational Excellence and Innovation at Michael Garron Hospital (MGH).

“I always knew from a young age that I wanted to work in healthcare. I was initially drawn to public health as I was fascinated by the social determinants of health and disease prevention. I studied Community Health and Epidemiology at the University of Toronto and got my first job at the Ministry of Health working with Dr. Sheela Basrur, the Chief Medical Officer of Health of Ontario. It was there that I really learned about the power of strong public health policy and its ability to positively impact the health of an entire population – something that has felt all too tangible during the COVID-19 pandemic.

After that, I worked at a healthcare consulting firm and at two provincial healthcare agencies, gaining work and leadership experience in areas such as informatics, evaluation, health system strategy and quality management. I also went back to school to complete my Masters in Health Administration and become a certified executive coach.

I decided to make the move to a hospital after realizing that I wanted to apply my skills closer to patient care. MGH seemed like such a natural choice – I felt drawn to this hospital because of its progressive leadership and the fact that it serves the very community I call home.

Within weeks of coming to MGH, we experienced our Code Grey (information technology system disruption). Working in crisis mode so early in a new role really expedited the onboarding process and allowed me meet people and build relationships quickly. I am so thankful for my incredible team – I cannot credit them enough. Everyone was so helpful, competent and supportive – true to MGH’s culture!

The Quality, Operational Excellence and Innovation department is made up of so many important work areas such as patient safety, quality improvement, privacy and research that all work together to support the organization drive improvement. Over the past year, the team has taken on new areas of focus including preparing for our upcoming Accreditation and playing a key role in the hospital’s Code Grey and COVID-19 responses.

These past few months have become the highlight of my first year here at the hospital – seeing how our entire organization came together to rally against COVID-19 amazed me. I am immensely proud of how MGH responded and the leadership role we played within our community and beyond. It is pretty incredible what we can accomplish when we collectively harness our expertise, passion and dedication. There is a wealth of knowledge and depth of relationships at MGH. Over the course of the last year it has truly grown to feel like home. I am so proud to be a part of such an incredible organization and consider myself lucky to work alongside such an amazing team.”

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