SASKATOON – For nearly four decades, patients from across the province requiring the most complex and specialized physical and mental health care have been supported on their journeys at Royal University Hospital by Leslie and Irene Dubé.
The couple’s enduring commitment to RUH and its patients is nearing $8 million thanks to their most recent donation of $2 million for the purchase of the hospital’s first dual modality Single Proton Emission Computed Tomography and Computed Tomography (SPECT-CT) diagnostic imaging scanner.
“We are extremely grateful to Leslie and Irene for their longstanding support, incredible kindness, and selfless giving in nurturing patient care excellence and innovation at RUH,” says Jennifer Molloy, CEO, Royal University Hospital Foundation. “Their generosity is more than a donation, it is an investment in a healthier tomorrow for residents of Saskatchewan, helping ensure patients have access to the most advanced life-saving care at RUH when they most need it.”
SPECT-CT scanners help doctors make earlier and more accurate diagnosis and treatment plans for patients with life-threatening conditions involving the heart, lungs, brain, and various cancers, for example. This leading-edge technology merges two separate scanning functions to produce a single high-quality 3-dimensional picture that simultaneously shows how an organ is functioning and the precise location and size of abnormalities.
“The generous donation from Leslie and Irene will enable us to shorten scan times, lower radiopharmaceutical and x-ray doses used during the scans, and produce the highest quality images possible for about 4,500 patients a year,” says Dr. Sundeep Nijjar, RUH Nuclear Medicine Department Head. “Thanks to this gift, patients will have access to the newest, fastest, and safest molecular diagnostic imaging service in the province at RUH.”
The new SPECT-CT is expected to be operational later this summer following its arrival, installation and required staff training.
Leslie and Irene, who founded the Concorde Group of Companies in Saskatoon more than 60 years ago, made their first major donation to RUH in 1987 of $10,000 to purchase Surgery Unit beds. Their largest is a $3 million gift in 2006 that helped build the 71-bed Irene and Leslie Dubé Centre for Mental Health that opened in 2010 adjacent to RUH. A summary of their gift-giving history to RUH is at https://ruhf.org/irene-and-leslie-dube/
(
