Dr. Pagenkopf: The Evolution Of General Surgery & Endoscopy At Canmore General Hospital

Anyone who has spent time in Canmore and the surrounding area can attest to the fact that this place has a unique energy about it. With community at the forefront of all local endeavours, it’s impossible not to feel safe and cared for within this valley. If you or one of your loved ones has spent time at the Canmore General Hospital (CGH), you have likely noticed the same qualities within those walls, too.

Additionally, if you or one of your loved ones has undergone a surgical procedure in Canmore, it’s likely that you’ve encountered Dr. Cort Pagenkopf, of General Surgery and Endoscopy. As the town’s only General Surgeon and Endoscopist, he is a vital part of our community and a familiar face to many.

“Canmore hospital is a wonderful place,” said Dr. Pagenkopf. He described the whole experience, from start to finish, as exceedingly positive; “Whether it’s coming through the front desk and how you’re greeted, or how you’re treated by the acute care nurses, or when you arrive at surgical day care and have your IV started.” Even though many people coming through the doors of the hospital find themselves in difficult situations, Dr. Pagenkopf says that patients always have positive things to say about their experiences at CGH.

As for Dr. Pagenkopf, he found himself in Canmore in 1999 after completing a Zoology degree with a minor in Physics at the University of Calgary followed by Med School and his surgical residency at the University of Alberta in Edmonton.

He grew up in Calgary, often coming out to the Bow Valley to go fishing with his father. As a kid “I wanted to own a water ski & boat shop,” the now-surgeon explained. “But my father, who was the only one of his five brothers to go to university, said he’d kill me if I didn’t go to school. He was very encouraging to do something with some higher education and he gave me every opportunity to do that, so I took advantage of it and went all the way through school.”

After finishing his surgical residency in Edmonton, Dr. Pagenkopf was considering taking a five-year contract in Australia which included a house on the ocean and sounded like the perfect compromise between his childhood boat shop dreams and his adulthood medical endeavours. Though, the tragic and sudden passing of his father led him to seek a next chapter a little closer to home.

“I made some phone calls, I got ahold of Betsy Hall-Findlay in Banff and Rick Balharry here in Canmore,” he recalled. “As it happened, Canmore and Banff were looking to bring on a general surgeon. All I had to do was finish my exams and pass and I had a job.”

A job close to home in a gorgeous mountain town developing a brand new general surgery program at the Canmore General Hospital. It sounded like a win, win for Pagenkopf. Though, at first, it didn’t go exactly to plan.

“I thought I was going to starve to death! In my first week, I had six patients and in my second week I had five patients and I thought ‘I’m never going to survive here.’ But, as word of mouth grew that there was a local surgeon, local physicians started referring patients.” Luckily, Dr. Pagenkopf began to build a trusted reputation in town, garnering referrals, and soon a demand became clear. As a general surgeon, he is well-versed in a wide breadth of surgery.

Though, it was evident that what Canmore was in need of was “endoscopy and setting up a GI program where we do gastrostomies, colonoscopies, screening,” and other procedures of the sort, the surgeon explained. “That’s the aspect of my practice that just exploded. It grew so quickly that it’s now comprising 75% of what I do and has been for a long time.” As he sees it, the general surgeon had turned into the town gastroenterologist as an answer to what the community so clearly needed.

Dr. Pagenkopf has a highly demanding schedule, working with a 12-16 month wait list for elective endoscopies. He performs about 12 scopes a day and, though it’s busy, he is immensely passionate about his work, as he has been since he first arrived at the Canmore General Hospital “as a young grasshopper.”

“You have a problem, you operate, the patient wakes up, they feel immediately better, and they’re home tomorrow. It’s incredibly rewarding.”

During Dr. Pagenkopf’s long days in the Endoscopy Suite, he relies heavily on his education, experience, skill, and the medical equipment required for every procedure. Though having the best possible equipment elevates both the surgeon’s experience and the patient’s, there are always areas of need at the hospital that take priority when it comes to budgeting.

In situations where the hospital simply can’t afford to fix or replace an invaluable piece of equipment, Dr. Pagenkopf has turned to the Canmore Hospital Foundation for support.

In 2016, the Endoscopy Renovation Suite project totaled $126,000 and provided the hospital with an elevated operating room specifically for endoscopy or for use as a second OR in emergency situations. Within the suite, the Foundation was able to provide Automated Endoscope Processors and Table worth $40,000 and an Endoscopy Monitor worth $10,000.

Dr. Pagenkopf spoke to the importance of the Foundation’s support and the Foundation’s donors through highlighting the impact of just the new Endoscopy Monitor that was installed during the renovation.

“I don’t think that there’s a physician or a nurse here that isn’t thankful for the work that these volunteers do, that the foundation does, the fund-raising efforts, the golf tournament, and of course all of those that not only work for the foundation, but that donate.”

In regards to the monitor, he explained that they had reached a difficult situation where it was beginning to fail. “It was blacking out and blacking out. It worked most of the time, but not all of the time. You’d be in the middle of a scope and it would back out and you’d have four seconds without an image.” Though this may sound brief, he explained that if you were trying to deal with a bleed or something of the sort, it was a serious problem.

To further illustrate how this one piece of equipment impacts his practice, he explained that it is “all about image quality.”

“I do a lot of colonoscopies for cancer screening. Colon cancer is the second leading cancer killer in men and women who don’t smoke. Nobody talks about it so nobody understands just how common it is,” he continued.

According to Dr. Pagenkopf, almost every colon cancer starts with a “pre-cancerous growth called a polyp.” His job is to find and remove these polyps. “The better the image quality the more likely you are to find the polyps which are only 1 or 2 millimeters in size.” The surgeon says that the last thing you want to do is miss a polyp and that “things like this great monitor we have now improve the quality and the safety of the work that’s being done.”

He finished by explaining that “the better quality the equipment, the better quality the endoscopist.”

Dr. Pagenkopf and every member of the team at the Canmore General Hospital “takes great pride in being able to say that they’re part of the Canmore Hospital surgical program or emerge program,” he says. “I’m very proud of this hospital and what we’re able to do here.”

While he is passionate about this community, about his diverse range of hobbies including woodworking and sailing, and about his career as a surgeon, he is passionate about patient care, first and foremost.

One may not think to donate towards a new monitor in an endoscopy suite, but the benefit of just this one piece of equipment has been paramount for Dr. Pagenkopf’s work and for his countless patients in the Bow Valley. When the donations to the Foundation go towards the greatest area of need, this sort of equipment is exactly what you may be funding.