Tell us about yourself!
Hi, my name is Stephanie Anthony-Brown and I am an occupational therapist (OT) in acute care at Michael Garron Hospital (MGH). I started working at MGH in the spring of this year.
What motivated you to join MGH?
My family and I were relocating from Yellowknife to Toronto and I was already familiar with the east end of the city. I have family members living here who have received care at MGH and they told me about the community feeling surrounding the hospital. I have worked in acute care before, but not at a hospital as big as MGH, so I also thought it would be a new challenge for me to take on professionally.
What types of learning, mentorship or professional development opportunities have you had the opportunity to pursue since joining MGH?
I’ve only been at MGH for about five months, but I’ve had the opportunity to be mentored by my incredible OT colleagues.
In joining the OT team at MGH, I was automatically paired for two weeks with one of my coworkers who acted as my mentor. After that, I have been grateful to shadow and learn from my other acute care OT colleagues.
I have also had the opportunity to attend a Preceptor Education Training Day. The training I’ve received here will allow me to take on and mentor OT students at the hospital.
Can you share your career path at MGH?
2023: I was so excited to be hired at MGH as an OT! I joined the Acute Care Team on one of MGH’s medicine units and am excited to hone and further develop skills I’ve learned in smaller hospital settings.
I look forward to working with the medicine units and seeing what other future opportunities await! It would be interesting to work in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), Prolonged-Ventilation Weaning Centre of Excellence (PWC), and Cardiac Intensive Unit (CIU) with stroke patients.
What motivates or inspires you?
It is an honour and a privilege to be able to support people to live the lives that they want and to be involved in their care when people are often at their most vulnerable.
OTs do so much to enable people to do the things in life that are the most meaningful and important to them. There is also so much to learn from our clients as well. It is inspiring to witness people learning, healing and growing, and being a part of their journey.
If you could share one memorable moment from your time at MGH, what stands out to you?
There are so many memorable moments when working as an OT!
One example is when I met a new patient who was in hospital for several issues, including heart failure and kidney dysfunction.
They had not been able to get out of bed for a few days and had to use diapers. I remember when the patient was able to sit at the edge of the bed and stand with assistance – they were so happy to not be lying in bed anymore! We talked about transitioning from diapers to using a bedside commode instead and the patient was even more thrilled by this!
This patient was gaining some of their dignity and independence back and that made it a great day for both of us.