The Beaudry lab is focused on understanding how excess dietary fat and elevated stress, pancreatic and gut-derived hormones impact white and brown fat tissue biology. Fat tissue is a very interesting organ to study as it highly sensitive to its surrounding external and internal environments. Healthy fat function is important to overall health and energy balance, and we hope to use our studies to provide insight into chronic metabolic disease development such as obesity and type 2 diabetes.

Denis P. Blondin is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences at the Université de Sherbrooke and researcher at the Centre de recherche du Centre hospitalier universitaire de Sherbrooke (CRCHUS). His research focuses primarily on identifying organs, mechanisms and therapeutic strategies that can be stimulated to dissipate excess energy and investigating the impact of differentially timed lifestyle interventions on preventing the development of type 2 diabetes (TIMED consortium).

Dr. Virginie Blanchette’s research interests focus on the prevention and management of lower limb complications of diabetes, such as diabetic plantar ulcers and amputation. She is particularly interested in knowledge translation, including shared decision-making and stakeholder engagement, for optimal health approaches in inter-professional teams, and frontline medicine.

Dr. Michael Brent is a participating team member in the development of a diabetic retinopathy screening program that includes a best practices approach for early diagnosis and management to reduce blindness and visual disability. Tele-ophthalmology is an important program component, with emphasis on Indigenous and inner-city communities. Patient engagement in research protocols, and attention to sex and gender issues are essential cornerstones of program development.

Her research interests are in developing, implementing and evaluating innovative tools and strategies to improve diabetes and other cardiovascular risk factors in the community. Her multi-method research program includes epidemiology (i.e., the use of large clinical and administrative data sources), health services research, and pragmatic clinical trials. Her award-winning program of work importantly engages and is informed by people (i.e., patient partners), health care providers and decision makers.

Her research aims to understand the patients’ experience with diabetes self-management, to inform on the effectiveness, benefits and risks of different diets and to explore strategies for timely access to diabetes education and support. Her approach builds on close collaboration between patients, clinicians and researchers. She is co-directing the development and management of a prospective registry of patients with type 1 diabetes in Quebec (BETTER registry) and, more recently across Canada.

Her research focuses on health outcomes related to diabetes; specifically, how socioeconomic, environmental and health care factors influence the risk of diabetes and its complications. She has extensive experience in using large provincial health care and survey databases, and in using geographic information systems (GIS) methodology to study contextual factors influencing the development of diabetes.

Dr. Onil Bhattacharyya, Frigon-Blau Chair in Family Medicine Research, works closely with policy makers and system partners to evaluate new virtual care models that address system needs and are poised to scale, particularly for patients with complex needs. His research focuses on implementing new virtual care models within a particular clinical context and modifying them until he finds a balance between benefits and barriers for both patients and providers.

The primary focus of Dr. Mathieu Belanger’s research program is to develop a better understanding of how behaviours develop and change over time, particularly with regard to participation in physical activity. Specific aspects of the research include identifying determinants of behavioural change and investigating the effects of behaviour change on health outcomes, including the management of diabetes. Other determinants of optimal diabetes care are also investigated from an epidemiological perspective using administrative databases.

Dr. Ereny Bassilious’s academic interests are in medical education research, particularly in interprofessional education and technology enhanced patient education. Her current study examines the role of numeracy in diabetes management for teens with type 1 diabetes and the effect of an innovative video game intervention on numeracy skills. Dr. Bassilious has an academic and clinical interest in pediatric obesity and type 2 diabetes