Researchers

Brigitte Vachon’s work focuses on the development and evaluation of interventions aimed at promoting patient participation in improving the quality of health services, as well as fostering interprofessional collaboration. She is also interested in the analysis of factors and the evaluation of strategies promoting change in professional practices in primary care and rehabilitation. She is a member of the Ordre des ergothérapeutes du Québec.

Bruce’s research, funded by CIHR, JDRF, and the Stem Cell Network, aims to understand how pancreatic islet beta cells function and why they are lost or are dysfunctional in both type 1 and type 2 diabetes and following transplantation. He has made contributions to our understanding of islet inflammation, the biosynthesis of beta cell hormones, and the pathophysiology of the beta cell peptide islet amyloid polypeptide. He has chaired and served on review panels for CIHR, JDRF, and NIH, is currently an associate editor of the journals Islets and Diabetes, and sits on the editorial boards of Endocrinology and Diabetologia. His contributions to diabetes research and service have been recognized by the Diabetes Canada Young Scientist award (2006), a Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal (2013), and the Geoffrey L Hammond Lectureship (2016).

Xiaolin is a medical doctor, public health specialist, professor and the Dalla Lana Chair in Global Health Policy in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health (DLSPH), University of Toronto.  He was elected as a Fellow of the Faculty of Public Health of UK in 2012, and a Fellow of Canadian Academy of Health Sciences in 2022. Xiaolin is the faculty co-lead for implementation science in DLSPH. He has led randomized trials to change clinical practice and make impacts at the policy level in areas of antimicrobial resistance, tuberculosis control and diabetes/ hypertension care. He currently leads a pragmatic trial to investigate the effect of employing telemedicine to improve care for diabetes, hypertension and COVID-19 in rural Pakistan. He has published over 140 peer reviewed research papers, and led over $10m research funding as the principal investigator from MRC, DFID, CIHR, StopTB Partnership and HK RGC. He serves as board member and has served as the Secretary General and Vice President of the International Union of Lung Disease.

Dr. Alanna Weisman is a Clinician Scientist and Endocrinologist at Mount Sinai Hospital and University Health Network. She is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Toronto, a Clinician Scientist at the Lunenfeld Tanenbaum Research Institute, and an adjunct Scientist at ICES.  Her research program is focused on investigating and understanding determinants of outcomes in type 1 diabetes, to ultimately inform novel management strategies.

Don’s academic work has focused on three areas: governance over the use of personal information and biological samples for health research; boundaries between research and practice in public health, focusing on the ethical conduct of public health evaluative activities, regardless of whether they be labeled research, surveillance, quality improvement, etc.; and systems to support public/patient participation and involvement in the learning healthcare system. His work has informed much of the CIHR’s policy around privacy and access to data for research purposes – most notably through the document “CIHR Best Practices for Protecting Privacy in Health Research” , much of which has been incorporated into guidance the second edition of the Tri-Council Policy Statement on Ethical Conduct of Research Involving Humans. His work with Public Health Ontario resulted in the development of an innovative harmonized approach to the ethical conduct of public health evaluative activities.

With an interdisciplinary background in human factors engineering and social sciences, Dr. Witteman’s research is about person-centred digital health, including a focus on how best to adapt technology to people rather than expecting people to adapt to technology. She specializes in human-computer interaction in health education, risk communication and decision making, including design methods to support inclusive user- and patient-centeredness. Dr. Witteman has lived with type 1 diabetes since being diagnosed as a young child in 1983. Her role in Diabetes Action Canada is to serve as a bridge between people whose lives involve managing diabetes 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and scientists who study diabetes but don’t live with it.

David Wong, is an Honours graduate from the University of Toronto’s Medical Doctorate program who specializes in Vitreous and Retina surgery after completing a residency in ophthalmology at U of T and a fellowship with Dr. Michael Shea in Toronto followed by a second fellowship with Dr. Stanley Chang in Columbia, New York. Dr. Wong is a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada and is certified by the American Board of Ophthalmology. He is also a member of the Canadian Ophthalmology Society, the American Academy of Ophthalmology, the American Society of Retina Specialists and the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology. His recent interests include better diabetic retinopathy surveillance that may catch the disease in the earlier stages and developing new ophthalmic biomaterials.

Jane Yardley, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Physical Education at the University of Alberta’s Augustana Faculty in Camrose, Alberta, a member of the Alberta Diabetes Institute, and a member of the Women and Children’s Health Research Institute. Jane’s earlier work focused on blood glucose responses to resistance exercise, and the impact of prandial status (fasted vs. fed) on these responses. Her recent work has focused on sex and gender-related differences in exercise behaviours and blood glucose responses to exercise in people with type 1 diabetes, with a particular emphasis menses and menopause. She is a co-author of the 2016 American Diabetes Association Consensus Statement on Exercise and Physical Activity in Diabetes, and a recipient of the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, Alberta New Investigator Award.

Rose Yeung is an academic endocrinologist with special interest in diabetes quality improvement. Her aim is to co-create interventions and improved care processes for preventing and reducing the burden of diabetes in partnership with people with lived experience of diabetes, health care team members, and other system stakeholders. She is also a Senior Medical Director for the University of Alberta Office of Lifelong Learning and Physician Learning Program.

Nancy Young is a full Professor at Laurentian University and holds a Research Chair in Rural and Northern Children’s Health. She began her career as a Scientist at the Hospital for Sick Children, where she remains an Adjunct Scientist. Her 25-year research career has been devoted to health measurement for and with school-aged children. She held a Canada Research Chair (Tier II) from 2005 to 2015. The assessment of Indigenous children’s health has been Dr Young’s primary focus for the last decade, in collaboration with Mrs Mary Jo Wabano, who have co-created the Aboriginal Children’s Health and Well-being Measure (www.ACHWM.ca). The ACHWM is an important holistic outcome measure that is supporting the evaluation of diabetes prevention programs for youth across Canada.

Dr. Catherine Yu is an associate professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto, and an associate scientist at Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute of St. Michael’s Hospital. Dr. Yu’s research interests focuses on the role of patient and clinician behaviour change within knowledge translation for chronic disease management. She is particularly interested in the development of innovative strategies for continuing professional development and patient engagement in diabetes care.