PharmacoEpidemiology

Dr. Lorri Puil obtained her MD from the University of Toronto and has postgraduate training in internal medicine, hematology and clinical pharmacology. She holds a PhD from the University of Toronto in molecular biology (signal transduction), a field directly applicable to the development and assessment of novel therapeutics such as targeted molecules and biologics.

Dr. Puil has 15 years of experience in conducting systematic reviews and directing multidisciplinary knowledge synthesis teams in the evaluation of health care interventions. She is actively involved in teaching research synthesis methods, the critical appraisal of clinical trials and non-randomized studies, and evidence-based drug therapy to health professionals and students. Dr. Puil’s ongoing research interests are the benefits and harms of prescription drugs, including their molecular effects, and methods to improve the quality of evidence syntheses to support policy and clinical decision making.

Dr. Puil is a senior member of the Drug Assessment Working Group, a contributor to Therapeutic Letters, an Editor of the Cochrane Hypertension Group, and a member of the Cochrane & Campbell Equity Methods Group, which aims to improve the applicability of evidence to diverse populations.

Barbara Mintzes is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Sydney, Australia, and an Affiliate Associate Professor with the School of Population and Public Health at UBC. She has worked with the Therapeutics Initiative’s Drug Assessment Working Group to carry out systematic reviews of the effectiveness and safety of new drugs since 1999, and was in the Department of Anesthesiology, Pharmacology and Therapeutics and School of Population and Public Health at UBC until March 2015.

Dr Mintzes researches the effects of drug promotion, including direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription medicines, on prescribing, medicine use and thresholds for disease diagnosis.  She co-authored the book, “Sex, Lies and Pharmaceuticals” with Ray Moynihan in 2010.

At the University of Sydney, she works with the Charles Perkins Centre, a multi-disciplinary research centre focusing on obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. She co-leads the Charles Perkins Centre’s Evidence Synthesis Node, and is a member of the Bias and Research Integrity Node. Dr Mintzes holds a doctorate in epidemiology from the University of British Columbia. She has also worked for many years with consumer and women’s health organizations, in Canada and internationally.

In 2014-2016, Barbara Mintzes was a paid expert witness on behalf of plaintiffs in two Canadian class action suits, on cardiovascular risks of testosterone treatment, and on hormone replacement therapy and breast cancer. She has no other conflicts to declare.

Greg Carney holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Victoria in applied economics. He has a unique skill set which combines business analysis, economics, statistical programming, and epidemiology. Since 1999 he has worked as an economist, business analyst, health researcher, statistician, and epidemiologist. His research focuses on post market pharmaceutical surveillance and pharmaceutical outcomes using large health care utilization databases.

Anat Fisher obtained her M.D. degree from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel. She also has a Master of Health Administration from the Tel Aviv University in Israel. She worked as a family practitioner for many years and managed a Hospital Department in a Managed Health Organization. She is an experienced researcher and an expert in data analysis and trend analysis. She has conducted several systematic reviews on safety and efficacy of new drug therapies and is an author of Cochrane systematic reviews.

Richard Morrow holds an MA in Economics from the University of Victoria and a BA in English Literature from McGill University. His expertise includes policy analysis, communications, health economics, statistical methods and programming. Since 2004, he has worked as a research analyst in the areas of pharmaceutical policy and post-market drug safety and effectiveness.

Julie has a background in health care and an interest in research related to the medical field. Julie earned her BA in Nutrition from Bastyr University and MS in Health Care Policy and Management from SUNY Stony Brook. She formerly worked as a Registered Dietitian and health coach. She also completed an MA in Somatic Counselling Psychology from Naropa University and specialized in the treatment of eating disorders. Most recently, Julie worked as the Education Program Manager for the Centre for Blood Research, UBC. She is excited to continue working in a research setting with the Therapeutics Initiative (TI). Julie provides administrative support for TI executives and the TI team in their Victoria office.

Alan Brookhart is an Associate Professor at the University of North Carolina in the Department of Epidemiology – UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health. His research focuses on the development and application of statistical methods for drug utilization and outcomes research using large, health care claims data files. Areas of particular interest include the use of instrumental variable methods to assess short-term drug exposure effects, model selection strategies for efficient control of confounding, and multilevel analysis of prescription drug use data. He is also involved with the design and analysis of several cluster randomized trials. Dr. Brookhart received his PhD in Biostatistics from the University of California at Berkeley.

Conflict of Interest: Dr. Brookhart has received grant-funded support from Amgen for conducting research but no personal compensation or honoraria.

Scott Garrison has degrees in engineering physics and medicine, as well as a PhD in experimental medicine from the University of British Columbia. He has worked in Richmond, BC as a full-time office and hospital-based family physician since 1992 and has been a member of GPAC working groups producing the current BC provincial guidelines for the management of hypertension, stroke and cardiovascular risk reduction. He sat on the Primary Care Advisory Council for the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority and was the President of the Medical Staff for Richmond Hospital. He is also a clinical assistant professor with the UBC Dept of Family Practice and the principle investigator of a clinical trial exploring the role of magnesium in muscle cramping.