Dan Poenaru

Associate Academic Member

Professor, McGill University, Department of Pediatric Surgery

Biography

Dan Poenaru is a professor of pediatric surgery at McGill University and a senior scientist at the research institute of the McGill University Health Centre. He has a master’s degrees in health professions education and international development, and a doctorate in health strategy and management. Poenaru is a Fonds de recherche du Québec - Santé (FRQS) and a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)-funded investigator in patient-centered surgical care, head of the McGill CommiSur Lab, director of the Jean-Martin Laberge Fellowship in Global Pediatric Surgery, and a founding member of the Global Initiative for Children’s Surgery (GICS).

His current areas of academic interest are technology-assisted surgical communication and medical education, including AI, VR and digital health devices, patient-centred surgical care, and developing global surgical research capacity.

Current Students

Aylin Erman

Master's Research - McGill University

Principal supervisor :

Jackie Cheung

aylin.erman@mila.quebec

Hakima Laribi

PhD - Université de Sherbrooke

Co-supervisor :

Martin Vallières

hakima.laribi@mila.quebec

Website

Github

Jean Marie Tshimula

Postdoctorate - McGill University

jeanmarie.tshimula@mila.quebec

Mohsen Amoei

PhD - McGill University

mohsen.amoei@mila.quebec

Olivier Lefebvre

PhD - Université de Sherbrooke

Co-supervisor :

Martin Vallières

olivier.lefebvre@mila.quebec

Github

Publications

Determinants of Access to Essential Surgery in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Luc Malemo Kalisya

Ava Yap

Boniface Mitume

Christian Salmon

Kambale Karafuli

Dan Poenaru

Rosebella Onyango

2023-08-01

Journal of Surgical Research (published)

doi.org

Assessing the inclusion of children’s surgical care in National Surgical, Obstetric and Anaesthesia Plans: a policy content analysis

Sabrina Wimmer

Paul Truche

Elena Guadagno

Emmanuel Ameh

Lubna Samad

Emmanuel Mwenda Malabo Makasa

Sarah Greenberg

John G Meara

Tonnis H van Dijk

Dan Poenaru

Objective While National Surgical, Obstetric and Anaesthesia Plans (NSOAPs) have emerged as a strategy to strengthen and scale up surgical h… (see more)ealthcare systems in low/middle-income countries (LMICs), the degree to which children’s surgery is addressed is not well-known. This study aims to assess the inclusion of children’s surgical care among existing NSOAPs, identify practice examples and provide recommendations to guide inclusion of children’s surgical care in future policies. Design We performed two qualitative content analyses to assess the inclusion of children’s surgical care among NSOAPs. We applied a conventional (inductive) content analysis approach to identify themes and patterns, and developed a framework based on the Global Initiative for Children’s Surgery’s Optimal Resources for Children’s Surgery document. We then used this framework to conduct a directed (deductive) content analysis of the NSOAPs of Ethiopia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania and Zambia. Results Our framework for the inclusion of children’s surgical care in NSOAPs included seven domains. We evaluated six NSOAPs with all addressing at least two of the domains. All six NSOAPs addressed ‘human resources and training’ and ‘infrastructure’, four addressed ‘service delivery’, three addressed ‘governance and financing’, two included ‘research, evaluation and quality improvement’, and one NSOAP addressed ‘equipment and supplies’ and ‘advocacy and awareness’. Conclusions Additional focus must be placed on the development of surgical healthcare systems for children in LMICs. This requires a focus on children’s surgical care separate from adult surgical care in the scaling up of surgical healthcare systems, including children-focused needs assessments and the inclusion of children’s surgery providers in the process. This study proposes a framework for evaluating NSOAPs, highlights practice examples and suggests recommendations for the development of future policies.

2023-04-01

BMJ Open (published)

doi.org

Picture Cards Versus Physical Examination: A Proof-of-Concept Study to Improve the SOSAS Survey Tool.

Adesoji Ademuyiwa

Benedict C. Nwomeh

Dan Poenaru

Justina O. Seyi-Olajide

Iyabo Y. Ademuyiwa

Tinuola O. Odugbemi

Ogechi Abazie

Oluwaseun A. Ladipo-Ajayi

Olufemi Bankole

Olumide A. Elebute

Babasola Okusanya

Felix M. Alakaloko

Eyitayo O. Alabi

Ayomide Makanjuola

Shailvi Gupta

Tu Tran

Amanda Onwuka A

Emily R. Smith

Riinu Pius

Ewen Harrison … (see 1 more)

Christopher O. Bode

2023-04-01

Journal of Surgical Research (published)

doi.org

Definitive Care for Severely Injured Children in Quebec

Mélyssa Fortin

Zoe Atsaidis

Brent Hopkins

Etienne St-Louis

Elena Guadagno

Debbie Friedman

Dan Poenaru

2023-01-01

Injury (published)

doi.org

Exploring trust development in families of children towards surgical and emergency care providers: A scoping review of the literature.

Olivia Serhan

Alexander Moise

Elena Guadagno

A. Issa

Dan Poenaru

2023-01-01

Journal of Pediatric Surgery (published)

doi.org

Family risk communication preferences in pediatric surgery: A scoping review.

Arthega Selvarajan

Brandon Arulanandam

Elena Guadagno

Dan Poenaru

2023-01-01

Journal of Pediatric Surgery (published)

doi.org

Invited commentary on Stoehr J et al: The personal impact of involvement in international global health outreach: A national survey of former operation smile student volunteers.

Dan Poenaru

2023-01-01

Journal of Pediatric Surgery (published)

doi.org

Patient experience or patient satisfaction? A systematic review of child- and family-reported experience measures in pediatric surgery.

Julia Ferreira

Prachikumari Patel

Elena Guadagno

Nikki Ow

Jo Wray

Sherif Emil

Dan Poenaru