OMD Luminary Awards – Frequently Asked Questions

The OntarioMD (OMD) Luminary Awards honour Ontario community-based physicians/clinicians and their staff who have demonstrated leadership to successfully implement certified electronic medical records (EMRs) and digital/virtual health tools in their practices to benefit their patients and ease the administrative burden on their practices.

What are the OMD Luminary Awards?

The OntarioMD (OMD) Luminary Awards honour Ontario physicians/clinicians and their staff who have demonstrated leadership to successfully implement certified EMRs and digital/virtual health tools in their practices to benefit their patients and ease the administrative burden on their practices.

Who is OntarioMD (OMD)?

OntarioMD's dedication to providing value to Ontario's physicians/clinicians and the health system through digital health products and services has been recognized with multiple awards for excellence, leadership and innovation. Our staff have connected more than 30,000 Ontario clinicians and their staff to our products and services that integrate patient data to enhance patient care. We support them with our extensive knowledge of clinical practice, and our digital health expertise. We educate clinician practices on the latest developments in digital health and virtual care and how to use these new tools effectively. We partner with governments across Canada and with the private sector to accelerate digital and virtual care for Canadians.

OMD is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Ontario Medical Association. It is funded by the Province of Ontario.

Who is eligible to be nominated for an OMD Luminary Award?

OMD Luminary Awards are open to Ontario community-based (primary care providers and specialists) clinicians and their staff. Individuals or entire practices (teams) can be nominated for an award. Please review the Guidelines for more details. Physicians/clinicians and practice staff who are nominated must use an electronic medical record (EMR) certified by OMD. Certified EMRs are the only EMRs in Ontario that are connected to provincial digital health systems.

If a physician/clinician, non-clinician or team has previously won an OMD Luminary Award, they are not eligible to win another award for the same success story or contribution to advancing digital health in Ontario. They are welcome to submit for another award for a new success story in the same or a subsequent year.

What are the criteria for this award?

OMD would like to highlight outstanding contributions by individuals or teams to advance digital health among community-based practices. We are looking for the digital health success stories of individuals or practices that have occurred within the past two years (July 2021 to July 2023). Digital health success stories can highlight how the nominee uses digital health in their practice or how the nominee helped other physicians/clinicians and practice staff use digital health. The success stories will be verified by OMD staff who support Ontario community-based practices. Physicians/clinicians and non-clinicans who practice full-time in hospitals are not eligible. Individuals or teams must be nominated under one of the five categories. Please review the Guidelines for more details.

How do I submit a nomination?

All nominators for the OMD Luminary Awards must use the online Nomination Form. All nomination forms must be complete and submitted. Incomplete forms will not be accepted.

How are the winners selected?

All complete nominations will be judged by OMD's Luminary Awards Judging Committee. The Committee will assess the nominations and will award Luminary Awards to those nominations that the Committee determines, in its sole and absolute discretion, meet the goal of demonstrating leadership to successfully implement EMRs and digital/virtual health tools in the nominees' practices to benefit their patients and ease the administrative burden on their practices. All decisions are final.

Does the nominee have to use an OMD-certified EMR?

Yes, the nominee must use an OMD-certified EMR. Certified EMRs are the only EMRs in Ontario that are connected to provincial digital health systems. They have met a minimum set of requirements necessary to participate as a point of service to access provincial systems such as Health Report Manager (HRM®), Insights4Care (i4C) Dashboard, Digital Health Drug Repository (DHDR), eConsult, Ontario Laboratories Information System (OLIS), etc. They are built with data and messaging standards, identity management, and privacy and security features. Certified EMRs provide functionality such as data analytics dashboards leveraging national indicators for primary care as well as minimal clinical functionality to support practice workflows centred around the Cumulative Patient Profile. Because of these features, certified EMRs are the preferred EMRs for community-based practices and are used by more than 20,000 Ontario physicians/clinicians.

Who can I contact if I have additional questions?

If you have additional questions about the OMD Luminary Awards, please consult the Guidelines or contact support@ontariomd.com.