ACAHO - Staff

Glenn G. Brimacombe

Appointed in January, 2002, Mr. Brimacombe is the first full-time President & Chief Executive Officer of the Association of Canadian Academic Healthcare Organizations (formerly known as the Association of Canadian Teaching Hospitals).

As the national voice of the country's Research Hospitals/Teaching Hospitals, Academic Regional Health Authorities & their Research Institutes - Mr. Brimacombe has overall responsibility for the strategic management of the organization, which provides national leadership, advocacy, and policy representation when it comes to the role of the federal government improving the performance of the health system; and advancing the impacts of health research and innovation in the delivery of health care to all Canadians.

Mr. Brimacombe is currently co-Chair of the Health Action Lobby (HEAL) - which is a coalition of thirty-four national health and consumer organizations dedicated to protecting and strengthening Canada's health care system.  HEAL represents more than half a million providers and consumers of health care.

He also serves as Board Chair of the Science Media Centre of Canada (SMCC) whose mission is to inform public policy debate with evidence-based accurate science.  Here, there is a unique role for the SMCC play in linking the science community with the media.

Recently, he was the co-Chair of the Steering Committee for the National Task Force on the Future of Canada's Academic Health Sciences Centres, which released the seminal report Three Missions...One Future - Optimizing the Performance of Canada's Academic Health Sciences Centres in 2010.

Prior to joining ACAHO, Mr. Brimacombe held the position of Director of Health Programs at the Conference Board of Canada where he developed and implemented an integrated strategic plan to expand the Board's work in the area of health, health care and wellness.  Mr. Brimacombe also spent 10 years with the Canadian Medical Association (CMA) and left the organisation in 2000 as its Director of Economic Affairs.  Mr. Brimacombe has been on Executive Interchange with Health Canada, focusing on the strategic and policy issues related to developing national approaches to pharmacare in Canada.

Through his professional career, Mr. Brimacombe has been involved in a number of health policy and economic areas, including: health system reform; health system financing; national approaches to health research, innovation and commercialization; federal-provincial/territorial transfers; physician payment models, medical profession-government negotiations; and other direct economic/tax policy issues.

Mr. Brimacombe has also been a Board member of the Canadian Health Economic Research Association (now the Canadian Association of Health Services and Policy Research), Friends of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (FCIHR), and sat as a member of the federal government's Sectoral Advisory Group on International Trade in health.

Born in Montreal, Mr. Brimacombe received his honours degree in Economics from the University of Ottawa in 1986, and obtained his Master's Degree in Economics, specialising in Labour Economics from the University of Ottawa in 1988.

Beatrice Keleher Raffoul

Previously, Ms. Keleher-Raffoul was Senior Vice President with The Strategies Group, and has over 15 years experience in the workings of government and politics.

Before joining The Strategies Group team, Beatrice was Vice President, External Relations, for the Canadian Film and Television Production Association. She has served them as a consultant on issues related to federal and provincial tax policy, copyright, film, television and new media funding policy, as well as industry training programmes. She has also represented a Francophone post-secondary institution in Ontario, a company in the Biodiesel sector of alternative fuels, as well as a company in the public safety sector.

Previous experience includes, Senior Political Advisor, to the Minister of National Defence and Veterans Affairs, Director of Operations, to the Minister of Canadian Heritage.

Beatrice has experience in the development and implementation of public policy. Her contacts and experience extend federally, provincially and municipally.

Currently, Beatrice Keleher Raffoul is a member of the Board of the Glebe Centre Inc. (a long-term care facility for seniors in Ottawa); Chair of the fundraising project for the Glebe Centre Inc. to raise $4.2 million; Member of the Board of the Rencontres internationales du documentaire de Montreal (RIDM); Member of the Board of the Ottawa International Jazz Festival; L’association mondiale des Anciennes du Sacre Coeurs (NGO promoting the education of young women with educational development projects around the globe).

Beatrice has a Bachelor of Arts degree from Université de Montréal, a Diploma in Personnel and Industrial Relations, Concordia University. She has taught English and History in Lebanon, and worked in the field of Personnel/Human Resources for the City of Westmount. She is fluently bilingual.

Tina Saryeddine

Tina Saryeddine is Assistant Vice-President of Research and Policy Analysis. In her role at ACAHO, she works with members, colleagues and partners on research and policy issues related to the practice of academic healthcare organizations and their roles, functions, and returns to society and to the economy.

Tina recently completed a PhD in health services management and organizations from the Department of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto. Her thesis, entitled, Moving patients across organizations: Exploring the antecedents of effective and efficient referral processes, looked at the relationship between structure and performance in different types of referral processes, with a focus on what enabled effective inter-organizational communication and decision-making between different settings.

Prior to joining ACAHO in 2008, Tina was a Project Manager/Senior Planner at the GTA Rehab Network, an organization which brings together the 34 organizations involved in the delivery of publicly funded rehabilitation in the Greater Toronto Area. Her projects have received several awards and grants related to knowledge transfer and exchange including, the Ted Freedman Award for innovation in education, a Hygeia Award, a grant from the Canadian Nurses Foundation, CIHR Café Scientifique funding, and a grant from Ontario's Change Foundation.

Tina has served as a long-time reviewer for the International Forum on Quality and Safety in Healthcare hosted by the British Medical Journal Group and currently co-sponsored by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement and as an occasional article reviewer for various journals. She is a member of the Canadian College of Health Leaders from which she holds the Certified Health Executive designation and for which she has served a term as Treasurer of the GTA Chapter Executive in 2005. Tina is also an alumna of the University of Ottawa's Masters in Health Administration program, which she completed in 1999.

Alexandria Rowe (Tougui)

Alexandria Rowe joins ACAHO from Newfoundland where she studied Cultural Anthropology and Sociology at Memorial University of Newfoundland. Since moving to the mainland, Alexandria has had the opportunity to work at the Canadian Medical Association in the Member Services Centre as a representative, various government departments as an Administrative Assistant and the Bank of Canada as an Executive Assistant. Upon settling into her position as Executive Assistant at ACAHO, Alexandria has realized that the Health Sector is an area of great interest to her and an industry she intends to remain involved in.