Faculty Spotlights

Dr. Dimitri

Anastakis is a Professor of Surgery. He is a member of the School of Graduate Studies, IMS, and the Krembil Research Institute. Dr. Anastakis is studying cold sensitivity in patients with compression neuropathies and, in partnership with Dr. Karen Davis, structural and functional cortical changes following peripheral nerve injury, repair and rehabilitation.

Dr. Mohammad

Akbari is an assistant professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, and a scientist at Women’s College Research Institute, Women’s College Hospital. His research interest is in studying genetic susceptibility to cancers, including breast, ovarian, esophageal, pancreas and prostate cancers.

Dr. Ryan Brydges

studies two broad areas: (i) clarifying how healthcare trainees manage their lifelong learning, and (ii) understanding how to optimize the instructional design of healthcare simulation for training and assessment. He’s a Scientist and Associate Professor, Department of Medicine, UofT, and holds a Professorship in TechnologyEnabled Education at Unity Health Toronto.

Dr. Corinne Fischer

is a staff psychiatrist with the Mental Health Service at St. Michael’s Hospital, Associate Scientist, Co-director of neurodegenerative research at Keenan Research Centre for Biomedical Science and Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. Her major research focus is the interface between psychosis and neurodegeneration.

Dr. George Ibrahim

is a pediatric neurosurgeon at Sick Kids and Assistant Professor at the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, the IMS, and the Dept. of Surgery. His interests include the surgical treatment of medically intractable epilepsy, spasticity and functional disorders in children and the study of neural networks in children with epilepsy and functional disorders by combining connectomic, computational neuroscience and machine learning approaches.

Dr. Jennifer Jones

is the Butterfield Drew Chair in Cancer Survivorship Research and the Director of the Cancer Rehabilitation and Survivorship Program at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre. In addition, she is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry (primary) and the Dalla Lana School of Public Health, at University of Toronto.

Dr. Farzad Khalvati is the Endowed Chair in Medical Imaging and Artificial Intelligence (AI) at the Hospital for Sick Children. His research in Intelligent Medical Image Computing Systems (IMICS) Lab focuses on the design and development of AI-driven diagnostic and prognostic solutions for different diseases, including cancer, with the goal of delivering precision medicine to patients.

Dr. Istvan Mucsi

(MD, PhD) is a clinician investigator, transplant nephrologist (University Health Network) and Associate Professor of Medicine (UofT). His research focuses on equitable access to kidney transplant for patients from racialized communities. He is also building an electronic patient reported outcome measure platform for transplant recipients.

Dr. Mark Sinyor

is a Psychiatrist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre and an Associate Professor at the University of Toronto. His research focuses are suicide prevention and mood disorders and he is the founder of PROGRESS (the Program of Research and Education to Stop Suicide).

NEW IMS FACULTY

Dr. Rayzel Shulman

develops and evaluates health services interventions to improve the health and quality of care for youth living with diabetes, including the transition to adult care and reducing socioeconomic disparities in care and outcomes. She is interested in developing and evaluating interventions that leverage existing population-level administrative datasets to inform health system change. Dr. Eliane Shore is a member of the division of Gynaecologic Surgery and Pelvic Medicine at St. Michael’s Hospital. Her research interests include surgical simulation, surgical education, resident selection, the Operating Room Black Box, and development of a Canadian obstetrics and gynecology educational video library (TVASurg.com).

Dr. Sebastian

Hobson (MD, PhD, MPH FRANZCOG FACOG FRCSC) is a Maternal Fetal Medicine Specialist at Mount Sinai Hospital and Assistant Professor of Obstetrics & Gynaecology at the University of Toronto. He has strong clinical and research interests in labour and delivery care and advanced obstetric surgery.

Dr. Pascal Tyrrell

is a data scientist—a combination of research methodologist, computer/database solutions architect and innovator. He is the director of data science with the Department of Medical Imaging and associate professor with the IMS and the Department of Statistical Sciences. Pascal’s research interests include Artificial Intelligence in Medical Imaging.

Dr. Vanessa Gonçalves

is an Independent Scientist at the Tanenbaum Centre at CAMH and Assistant Professor (Dept of Psychiatry). She has a multidisciplinary background in statistical genetics and molecular biology. Her primary research focuses on the role of mitochondrial gene variants in the risk for and phenomenology of neuropsychiatric disorders. Her research includes pharmacogenetic studies focusing on the mitochondrial system, especially its effects on treatment response.

Dr. Farooq Naeem

is a psychiatrist at CAMH, Professor of Psychiatry at U of T, and a Cognitive Behaviour Therapist (CBT) who received training in CBT for psychosis from Professor David Kingdon. He pioneered techniques for culturally adapting CBT which were used to adapt CBT for a variety of common and severe mental health problems in South Asia, North Africa, Middle East and China and now Canada.

Dr. Maryse Bouchard

completed her orthopaedic surgery residency and a Masters’ at the U of T. Her fellowship training includes pediatric orthopedics at Seattle Children’s Hospital and limb reconstruction at Australia’s Royal Children’s Hospital. She cares for children with lower limb and foot and ankle deformities. Her research evaluates clinical outcomes of foot and ankle conditions, and access to orthopaedic care in resource-poor areas. Dr. Sheryl Spithoff is a physician at Women’s College Hospital and an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto. Her research interests include addictions and access to care as well the impact of conflicts of interest on medical education, research and technological innovations. She has expertise in qualitative and quantitative methodologies. Dr. Venkat Bhat is a psychiatrist based at two Depression Centres (St. Michael’s Hospital and University Health Network) and Director of the Interventional Psychiatry program at St. Michael’s Hospital. He leads an interdisciplinary program to offer emerging and procedural interventions, his research program aims to understand treatmentresponse with these emerging interventions.

By Sally Wu

Our spinal cord plays a vital role in day-to-day functions, serving as a bidirectional communication pathway for the brain and body. It allows us to perform a range of motions, from a simple flick of a finger to complex movements like running. Injuries to the spinal cord can result in a loss of sensation, weakness, incoordination, or even complete loss of muscle function. Most spinal cord injury (SCI) cases are now treated with surgery to restore a patient’s independence, however, there are few effective non-surgical treatment options. Dr. Michael Fehlings and his team at the Krembil Brain Institute are pioneers in the field of neural repair and regeneration. The Fehlings Laboratory is leading both clinical and preclinical studies that hold great promise for patients suffering from this irreversible condition.

As a University of Toronto alumnus, Dr. Fehlings completed his MD in 1983 and later received his PhD in 1989 through the Institute of Medical Science (IMS). Growing up in a German immigrant family with minimal experience with academia and medicine, it was the guidance of notable role models that inspired Dr. Fehlings to become a clinician-scientist. As a medical student, Dr. Fehlings recalls attending inspirational talks that first exposed him to research. One of them was presented by Dr. Nancy McKee, a remarkable plastic surgeon with a specific research interest in microvascular reconstructive surgery. Dr. Fehlings completed a summer student project in Dr. Mckee’s lab under Dr. Howard Clarke’s supervision, who was a PhD candidate at the time. This was an eye-opening experience because it unveiled the idea that as a clinician, one can also embrace research. At the time, there was little treatment for individuals with SCIs and the impact of these injuries were profound. After a particularly difficult on-call weekend as a junior neurosurgery resident, Dr. Charles Tator invited Dr. Fehlings to visit his lab where he studied acute SCIs from a basic science perspective.

“It was transformative because it made the decision for me to pursue graduate training in science,” Dr. Fehlings explained. As both a neurosurgeon and basic researcher, Dr. Tator played a pivotal role in fostering Dr. Fehlings’ passion for scientific inquiry. After graduating from the Surgeon-Scientist program at the University of Toronto, Dr. Fehlings completed a fellowship at the New York University Medical Centre where he built upon the necessary clinical and research skills that led him to where he is today. Dr. Fehlings also acknowledges the strong support of his family as being critical in his career development.

As a recipient of numerous prestigious national and international awards, the two most momentous awards for Dr. Fehlings

Dr. Michael Fehlings

MD, PhD, FRCSC, FACS, FRSC, FCAHS

Professor of Neurosurgery Vice Chair Research for the Department of Surgery Co-director of the University of Toronto Spine Program Faculty member of the Institute of Medical Science Neurosurgeon at Toronto Western Hospital and the University Health Network Gerry and Tootsie Halbert Chair in Neural Repair and Regeneration Senior Scientist at the Krembil Research Institute McLaughlin Scholar in Molecular Medicine Scientist at the McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine

“Some of the most important work that you will do in your life is the work you’re doing right now”

were the Olivecrona Award (2009) for his work in traumatic SCIs, and most recently the Ryman Prize (2019) for enhancing the quality of life for the elderly. The earlier discoveries from his graduate work with Dr. Tator has directly impacted clinical practice today. Traditionally, it was not recommended to operate on patients with SCIs until they are stabilized.1 However, it was the basic science discovery of the vascular hypothesis in secondary injuries in SCIs,2 that led to clinical trials for early surgical decompression within 24 hours that significantly improved neurological recovery.3 The translational efforts in this bench-to-bedside approach represent a remarkable progress for such a complex injury, improving the quality of life for patients and serving as a standard clinical guideline worldwide.

Today, Dr. Fehlings combines his active clinical practice in complex spinal surgery with translationally oriented research models that specialize in novel treatments such as regenerative medicine for traumatic and non-traumatic forms of SCIs. The Fehlings Lab has developed a line of novel, genetically engineered stem cells called the Spinal Microenvironment Modifying and Regenerative Therapeutic (SMaRT) cells that have the ability to break down glial scarring, a major barrier to regeneration. Although there are limitations to their use, the proofof-concept has been established and the SMaRT cells are part of a new era of regenerative medicine that may one day be able to repair what was once thought to be irreparable damage in chronic SCIs.

However, the work at the Fehlings Lab goes beyond just SCIs. In fact, Dr. Fehlings explains that the movement towards regenerative medicine has “potential impact for a range of devastating neurological conditions including stroke, brain trauma, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, and Parkinson’s disease.” Dr. Fehlings described exciting future work that combines regenerative medicine with rehabilitation processes. With the ability of SMaRT cells serving as the regenerative substrate coupled with activity-based rehabilitation, this multi-disciplinary model combines stateof-the-art strategies from both fields that could optimize clinical outcomes.

Like everyone, Dr. Fehlings and his team had to adapt when Toronto went into lockdown for COVID-19. Although it has been “turbulent”, Dr. Fehlings shared a few projects and positive lessons that he has learned over the last eight months. One of the projects includes providing pre and post-operative neurosurgical care virtually for patients in remote communities. This has reduced waitlists for assessments and greatly enhanced the access to care from specialists. In addition, despite the halt of international travel, the advantage of teleconference technology has been transformative in terms of facilitating international collaborations. Going forward, there are lessons learned that demonstrate what can and cannot be done well virtually. Procedures that can be efficiently performed through a virtual setting can save time and costs and redirect those resources to other needed areas.

As a professor and mentor for students and surgeons across the world, Dr. Fehlings also hasn’t forgotten what it was like to be in their shoes. He stated that his greatest achievements stemmed from his graduate work at IMS and it is important to acknowledge that “some of the most important work that you will do in your life is the work you’re doing right now.” Furthermore, he noted the importance to “try your best to get the very best training you can, because it will open your eyes and provide you with skill sets not just for your professional life, but to all sorts of other areas that will enrich your life.”

References

1. Donovan WH. Spinal cord injury—past, present, and future.

J Spinal Cord Med. 2007; 30(2):85-100. 2. Tator CH, Fehlings MG. Review of the secondary injury theory of acute spinal cord trauma with emphasis on vascular mechanisms.

J Neurosurg. 1991; 75(1):15-26. 3. Fehlings MG, Vaccaro A, Wilson JR, et al. Early versus delayed decompression for traumatic cervical spinal cord injury: results of the surgical timing in acute spinal cord injury study (STASCIS).

PloS One. 2012; 7(2):e32037. Available from:https://journals.plos. org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0032037 4. Fehlings MG, Tetreault LA, Wilson JR, et al. A clinical practice guideline for the management of patients with acute spinal cord injury and central cord syndrome: recommendations on the timing (≤24 hours versus >24 hours) of decompressive surgery. Global

Spine J. 2017;7(3 Suppl):195S-202S.