Yvette Bonny (born 1938) is a Haitian Canadian pediatrician. She arrived in Canada in 1962 where, unusually for a black immigrant, she become established as a doctor. In April 1980, she performed the first bone marrow transplant on a child in eastern Canada. As head of the paediatric bone marrow transplantation unit at Montreal's Hôpital Maisonneuve-Rosemont until 1998, she performed all the transplants herself. From 1972, Bonny was also a professor in the department of medicine at the Université de Montréal. She has received many awards and distinctions including the Order of Canada and the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal. [1] [2] [3]
Born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on 20 July 1938, [4] Yvette Bonny always wanted to become a medical doctor like her grandfather. After she had graduated from the department of medicine at the University of Haiti, in 1962 she arrived in Montreal, Canada, to continue her studies. [1] She specialized first in paediatrics at the Sainte-Justine Hospital. She had then hoped to return to Haiti but in view of the deteriorating political situation there, her parents encouraged her to stay in Canada. She therefore decided to extend her studies to haematology, receiving fellowships at the Hôpital Saint-Antoine in Paris and at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal. [1]
In 1970, at a time when most physicians were men, Bonny was engaged by the Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital, becoming one the first black women doctors to practice in Quebec. It was in April 1980 that she performed one of the first bone marrow transplants on a child. (The first being John Melbrew of Montreal, in 1979) The patient, Sonia Sasseville, later became a nurse at the same hospital. The operation proved to be a significant development in the treatment of children's ailments such as leukaemia and sickle cell anaemia. Heading the unit until 1998, Bonny herself performed all the subsequent bone marrow transplants on children. [1]
Bonny has taught medicine at the Université de Montréal from 1972, becoming a clinical professor in 1980. She has contributed to research on serious afflictions for children including leukaemia, cancer and drepanocytosis. [1]
Bonny was married to the geographer and Arctic explorer Pierre Gadbois with whom she had a daughter, Nathalie. Gadbois died in 2010. [5] In addition to her professional commitments, she supported young people from different cultural communities living in Montreal. These included young Haitian immigrants. She has served on the board of Entraide bénévole Kouzin Kouzin’, an organization which strives to integrate young people into Quebec society. She has also contributed to Leucan in its quest to support children suffering from cancer and their families. [1]
Jeanne Mance was a French nurse and settler of New France. She arrived in New France two years after the Ursuline nuns came to Quebec. Among the founders of Montreal in 1642, she established its first hospital, the Hôtel-Dieu de Montréal, in 1645. She returned twice to France to seek financial support for the hospital. After providing most of the care directly for years, in 1657 she recruited three sisters of the Religieuses hospitalières de Saint-Joseph, and continued to direct operations of the hospital. During her era, she was also known as Jehanne Mance contemporarily by the French, and as Joan Mance by the English contemporarily.
Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie is a borough (arrondissement) in the city of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is located in the centre-east of the city.
Paul David was a Canadian cardiologist, founder of the Montreal Heart Institute, and Senator.
The Centre hospitalier universitaire Sainte-Justine is the largest mother and child centre in Canada and one of the four most important pediatric centres in North America. It is affiliated with the Université de Montréal, located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
The Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal is one of two major healthcare networks in the city of Montreal, Quebec. It is a teaching institution affiliated with the French-language Université de Montréal. The CHUM is one of the largest hospitals in Canada; a public not-for-profit corporation, it receives most of its funding from Quebec taxpayers through the Ministry of Health and Social Services as mandated by the Canada Health Act. The CHUM's primary mission is to provide inpatient and ambulatory care to its immediate urban clientele and specialized and ultraspecialized services to the broader metropolitan and provincial population. Its mandate also includes pure and applied research, teaching, and the evaluation of medical technology and best healthcare practices. Every year, more than 500,000 patients are admitted for care at the CHUM.
Pierre Rene Grondin, was a Canadian cardiac surgeon who was one of the first doctors to perform a successful heart transplant. He was legendary in his surgical abilities and style and brought many innovations to the Montreal Heart Institute after his post-graduate training with pioneers Michael DeBakey and Denton Cooley in Houston, Texas. He was one of a select few heart surgeons worldwide who participated in the development of open heart surgery using the heart-lung machine in the early 1960s. He performed the first Canadian heart transplantation at the Montreal Heart Institute in May, 1968 shortly after the first successful heart transplant in the world in December, 1967 in Cape Town, South Africa by Dr. Christiaan Barnard.
Hôpital Maisonneuve-Rosemont is a hospital in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, located in the boroughs of Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie and Mercier-Hochelaga-Maisonneuve. It serves the eastern part of the city and offers 800 beds. It employs 5,000 people and 3,000 students annually.
The Jewish Rehabilitation Hospital (JRH) is a bilingual hospital offering general and specialized rehabilitation services in Laval, Quebec, Canada. It is the regional center in physical rehabilitation for adult and pediatric clients.
Luc Thériault is a Canadian academic and politician. As a member of the Parti Québécois, he served as a Member of the National Assembly of Quebec from 2003 to 2007, representing the Masson electoral district. In 2015, he was elected to the Canadian House of Commons representing Montcalm, as a member of the Bloc Québécois. He served as the Bloc Québécois House Leader from 2015 until 2017, and was the party's representative on the Special Committee on Electoral Reform.
Jean-Claude Tardif is the Director of the Research Center at the Montreal Heart Institute and Professor of Medicine at the University of Montreal. He received his medical degree (MD) in 1987 from the University of Montreal and specialized in cardiology and research in Montreal and Boston until 1994. Dr. Tardif holds the Canada Research Chair in personalized medicine and the University of Montreal endowed research chair in atherosclerosis. He is also the Scientific Director of the Montreal Health Innovations Coordinating Center (MHICC).
John M. Goldman was a British haematologist, oncologist and medical researcher. A specialist in chronic myeloid leukaemia, Goldman conducted pioneering research into leukaemia treatment – he was instrumental in the development of bone marrow transplantation as a clinical method, and later in the development of the drug imatinib. He was also a prolific author of scientific papers, was involved with numerous medical charities and had a decades-long surgical career at Hammersmith Hospital, London.
Irma LeVasseur was a Canadian physician. She was a pioneer in pediatric medicine and was the first French-Canadian woman to become a doctor. Her surname also appears as Le Vasseur.
De L'Assomption Boulevard is a main north–south street in the Montreal boroughs of Mercier–Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie and Saint-Léonard.
Alice Benjamin is a Canadian specialist in fetal and maternal medicine.
Daniel Evan Borsuk is a Canadian plastic surgeon in Montreal, Quebec, who is a pioneer in facial reconstruction. The first Canadian face transplant was performed under his leadership. He is also an advocate for pet safety and education, a supporter of universal health care, and an Officer of National Order of Québec.
Marina Cavazzana is a professor of Paediatric Immunology at the Necker-Enfants Malades Hospital and the Imagine Institute, as well as an academic at Paris Descartes University. She was awarded the Irène Joliot-Curie Prize in 2012 and elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2019.
The boroughs of Montreal, like the rest of Canada and the world, have been individually impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.