Eric Grafstein

Dr. Eric Grafstein is an emergency physician in Vancouver, BC. He is married to Dr. Patricia Daly, Chief Medical Health Officer for Vancouver Coastal Health.¹⁾

He received his MD from the University of Toronto in 1985 - the same year as Daly - and completed his Royal College training in Emergency Medicine at McGill University in 1991.

He is Clinical Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of British Columbia; Scientist at the Centre for Health Evaluation and Outcome Services (CHEOS); Regional Head of the Department of Emergency Medicine at Providence Health Care and Vancouver Coastal Health; and Chair of the Regional Emergency Services Program at Providence Health Care and Vancouver Coastal Health.²⁾

Grafstein has been practicing as an emergency physician at St. Paul’s Hospital since 1993 where he acted as Associate Research Director, and lead the development of an Emergency Administrative Database for Health Services Research. He also spearheaded several IT projects for VCH and SPH including an electronic discharge summary application and a real-time electronic ED dashboard.³⁾ He participated as Chief Medical Information Officer in the the Clinical & Systems Transformation (CST) project, funded by Vancouver Coastal Health, Providence Health Care and Provincial Health Services Authority.^{4) 5)} The project is to implement a patient identification centralization system designed by Cerner, a company which was acquired in December 2021 by Oracle.^{6) 7)}

Grafstein is also a Data Specialist member of the BC Emergency Medicine Network., The network is funded by the BC Academic Health Sciences Network, BC Ministry of Health, Rural Coordination Centre of BC, and the University of British Columbia. It is partnered with the BC Patient Safety & Quality Council, the Centre for Health Evaluation and Outcome Sciences (CHEOS) and their associated Patient Voices Network, Vancouver Coastal Health, Fraser Health, Interior Health, Island Health, Northern Health and the Provincial Health Services Authority.⁸⁾

He is also a member of the Research Committee, Research Consortium, and Chair of the National CEDIS Working Group with the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians (CAEP), where he authored a 2002 periodical announcing the results of a grant competition funded by Roche.^{9) 10)} The CAEP is partnered with Abbott, Alexion, AstraZeneca, BD, BrainScope, Brockville General Hospital, Canadian Blood Services, Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction, Choosing Wisely Canada, GBS/CIDP Foundation of Canada, General Electric Healthcare, Germitec, MD Financial Management, Nova Scotia Health, Novo Nordisk, Ontario Regional Blood Coordinating Network, Pendopharm, Recordati, Scotiabank, Servier, and SteriMax.^{11) 12) 13) 14) 15) 16)}

His research interests include health systems and systems research pertaining to hospital emergency departments, and critical emergency medicine. In 2017, he won an Honorable Mention for the Best Working Paper Award from INFORMS.¹⁷⁾

He co-authored a letter to the editor of the Canadian Journal of Emergency Medicine advising that “current public health efforts and future pandemic planning should focus on sustainable methods to support those in self-isolation with basic necessities and emphasize messaging to reduce in-home transmission and to raise overall adherence to self-isolation.”¹⁸⁾

Grafstein collaborated on two research papers with Dr. Andrew McRae, who serves as a member of the COVID-19 Scientific Advisory Group under Alberta Health Services.^{19) 20) 21)} The studies were funded by the MSI Foundation.

Grafstein conducted research alongside his wife on routine HIV testing in hospital. The study was funded by the BC Ministry of Health, and their co-author Julio Montaner declared receiving funds through his institution from AbbVie, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Gilead Sciences, Janssen, Merck, the National Institutes of Health and ViiV Healthcare.²²⁾

Further study funding comes from the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians Research Consortium, Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), Health Canada, the National Institute for Drug Abuse, and Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute.^{23) 24) 25) 26) 27)}

Grafstein and his collaborators found that the rate at which children presented to hospital emergency departments in BC with respiratory symptoms was lower by 56% during “peak pandemic period” compared to the previous year, as well as even sharper decreases for other causes.²⁸⁾ He also participated in a study on HealthLink BC, a government-owned telehealth service used during COVID-19. Funding comes from the BC Ministry of Health.²⁹⁾