Episode Two

Canada is… Canada means Home.

I'm Dr. Diego Delgado, I'm a cardiologist at the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre at the Toronto General Hospital, University Health Network, specializing in advanced heart failure and cardiac transplantation.

I'm originally from Buenos Aires, Argentina. It's a beautiful city. It's a very European city, very similar to Madrid and Paris. It's not very multicultural like Toronto and we definitely have much better weather than Toronto.

Dr. Diego Delgado is a cardiologist at the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre at the University Health Network. (Photo: UHN)

That's where I did all my training in internal medicine, cardiology. I finished in 1999. At that point, I have a few options and one of the options was to go to United States. I went to Chicago to do a fellowship in advanced heart failure and transplant.

When I was in Chicago, it happened to me that I arrived in the middle of winter with two luggage and not even a place to live. It was a friend of a friend of a friend who I called because I was desperate for help and this guy told me to go to his house. I didn't know this guy. I met him and he said stay with my family in my house until you find a place to stay.

Dr. Delgado completed his medical training in Buenos Aires, and still keeps his report card from 1989 in his office at the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre. (Photo: Dr. Diego Delgado)

That for me, changed my life because not only did he help to establish myself in North America but since I came to Canada, I'm doing exactly the same thing that I learned from here. I've been trying to help people who come to Canada, to establish in Canada, I offer my home, I offer everything because I always think that if you don't help people, how they can feel they are at home?

I spent one and a half years. And at that point, my decision was to come to Canada to continue my training in heart failure and transplant.

May 31 of 2000, I joined the heart failure program and I've been there in this program since then. Now I can say that after 17 years, I feel that somehow I, with my colleagues, of course, we built the program and now we have created a huge impact in the community, in our country, and all around the world and I was a witness of that from the very beginning.

I would say that UHN gave me everything I have so far. UHN gave me the opportunity to grow in my career, the opportunity to grow as a person, gave me a chance to meet amazing people, to make friends, give me the opportunity to represent UHN all around the world, and to become a Canadian.

Canada is a land of opportunities and I truly believe about that because I'm an example of that. I came with nothing and I have everything that I've always dreamed about, personal and in my career.

I come from places where even though you can fight very hard all your life, the country and the people doesn't give you the opportunity to grow. Here is the opposite. The more you grow, the more it seems that people want you to grow more.

Canada is my home. After travelling all around the world, changing countries, I can tell that this is the place I want to be.

Life is like a boomerang. You throw something, it comes back to you. If you throw good things, it will come back to you. I learned that and I teach that to my kids because that's the way, usually, what I live at least.

Though most of his classmates from medical school stayed in Argentina, Dr. Delgado keeps in touch with many of his fellow graduates. (Photo: Dr. Diego Delgado)

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Episode Two

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