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Arnold M Noyek

Director- Peter A Silverman Centre for International Health, Mount Sinai Hospital
Professor of Otolaryngology- Head and Neck Surgery, University of Toronto

Dr. Arnold Noyek was born in Dublin, Ireland, immigrated to Canada, graduated from Medical School at the University of Toronto, and trained in Otolaryngology at Manhattan Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital in New York City. He was Otolaryngologist-in-Chief at Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto, from 1989-2002, where he continues on staff since 1966. He is a consultant with the Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care in Toronto, serving the elderly with hearing disability for forty years. Dr. Noyek is a Professor of Otolaryngology, a Professor of Public Health, and a Professor of Medical Imaging (Radiology) at the University of Toronto. He is also Director of International Continuing Education for the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto and founding Director, the Peter A Silverman Centre for International Health, Mount Sinai Hospital (PASCIH). He is the founder of the Canada International Scientific Exchange Program (CISEPO) and is now a Senior Ashoka Fellow. Dr Noyek’s multifaceted involvements, innovations and networking have had a profound local, national and international influence. His career accomplishments have had a significant world-wide impact on the professional development of his health specialty, allied specialties and academic and scientific advancement through education, research, effecting best practice and societal change.
Presentation:
'Hearing Health as a Bridge to Peace'

Can you imagine Israelis, Jordanians and Palestinians working together in the field of hearing health – through a network of peaceful professional cooperation – tackling the high prevalence Middle East public health issue of genetic nerve deafness across the Arab and Israeli frontier? Deaf children (consanguineous marriages are common in the Middle East) are being detected at birth and habilitated through projects implemented by the first and only Arab and Israeli cross-border professional association, MEHA (the Middle East Association for Managing Hearing Loss). MEHA was brokered in 1998 by CISEPO (the Canada International Scientific Exchange Program - www.cisepo.ca). Academic cooperation among Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian faculty, health professionals, scientists, trainees, students, hospitals and universities - across borders and cultures, and beyond politics – and with the support of the Canadian government - has been happening successfully under the CISEPO umbrella since 1995. At that time, His Majesty the late King Hussein of Jordan invited the founder of CISEPO, based at Mount Sinai Hospital and the University of Toronto (and now including American CISEPO) to use its knowledge-sharing and capacity-building programs to build bridges of trust, confidence and people-to-people relationships across the Arab and Israeli divide. As otolaryngologists, audiologists, other health professionals, students and scientists we have taken up the challenge and initiated a model for knowledge sharing, first by progressively equipping deaf children for life in the region (EHDI) and then by promoting a broad range of cooperative health-to-peace initiatives. This presentation will provide a snapshot of a unique, durable network of peaceful professional cooperation - impacting on local and national policy, imbedding new ‘normals’ in university curricula, affecting the lives of ordinary people - thus creating a model for potential global application. We hope to capture your interest from the citizen sector and possible participation in Middle East or global health-to-peace initiatives.

Plenary #2: "Hearing Health as a Bridge to Peace"
Cassatt Ballroom
Monday March 1, 2010
4:10 PM - 5:10 PM