Bell Patient Decision Support Lab a Global Leader

When you face a tough health decision, you need sound advice and clear understanding to make the right choice for you and your family. This advice is a mere click away.

In 2004, Bell Canada was instrumental in helping launch the Bell Patient Decision Support Lab at The Ottawa Hospital with a generous $500,000 pledge. This online resource offers more than 300 decision aids to help you make important, value-based health decisions when faced with difficult choices.

There are currently about 300 decision aids available online to help patients (and health care professionals) make important health decisions when faced with difficult choices. The topics are wide and varied in scope, such as:

• Breast cancer: Should I have a lumpectomy or a complete mastectomy?
• Alzheimer’s disease: Should I put my ailing parent in a home?
• Circumcision: Should I have my son circumcised?

There is also a personal decision guide to help individuals and families make major life transition decisions about careers, post-secondary education and more.

In just two years, the Bell Lab has become the global hub for decision aids. In fact, it is considered the world standard for these tools—some 14 countries look to The Ottawa Hospital for guidance on developing and evaluating decision aids. These aids are also now being used in several classroom pilot projects across Canada to help train the next generation of nurses, doctors and patients.

The Ottawa Hospital and the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute are grateful to Bell for its vision in helping launch this lab. Generous support from key community and business leaders will help ensure the Hospital is ready when we need it most.

For more information, visit the Bell Lab at www.ohri.ca/decisionaid/

Read the news release.