Scientific Committee

Dr. Harminder Singh received his MBBS and MD from All India Institute of Medical Sciences and Masters of Public Health from the University of Manitoba. He received training in gastroenterology, IBD, gastrointestinal oncology and health outcomes research at University of Manitoba. He is currently an Associate Professor of Medicine, Dept. of Internal Medicine and Community Health Sciences, College of Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Manitoba. He is a former member of the Canadian Task Force on Preventive Health Care, an organization developing and disseminating clinical practice guidelines for primary care. He is a clinician scientist, epidemiologist and practicing gastroenterologist.

Dr Singh is a member of the Canadian Gastro-Intestinal Epidemiology Consortium (CanGIEC), and a co-author on the Steering Committee of the 2018 Burden of IBD Report for Crohn’s and Colitis Canada (Journal of the Canadian Association of Gastroenterology 2019). He has expertise in using administrative health care datasets to answer a variety of questions, including assessment of outcomes among individuals with inflammatory bowel disease.

Dr. Singh’s research interests have been varied and include clinical epidemiology, pharmaco-epidemiology and health services research. Dr. Singh has lead studies on epidemiology and prevention of colorectal cancer. He has lead studies assessing health care outcomes among individuals with IBD, including skin cancers, cervical cancer precursors, colorectal cancer, screening for cancers, risk of clostridium difficile infections, educational outcomes among those with IBD and care of elderly with IBD. He has lead knowledge translation studies to improve processes around colonoscopy, an essential test to diagnosis and manage those with IBD.

Dr. Lakatos is professor of medicine and director of IBD Centre at McGill University Health Centre. Until January 2017 he was head of the gastroenterology/hepatology ward, endoscopy unit and outpatient clinic at the 1^st Department of Medicine, Semmelweis University in Budapest, Hungary. He is a member of the IOIBD and one of the founders and leader of the Hungarian IBD Study Group. He is associate editor in J Crohn’s Colitis, Digestive Liver Diseases and World Journal of Gastroenterology and section editor in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases. During his career he published more than 400 original papers and reviews and 26 book chapters. His primary research interest is the epidemiology, quality of care, outcomes research and optimization of old and new medical therapies in IBD.

Dr. Murthy received his M.D. at the University of Ottawa, residency training in internal medicine at The University of Manitoba and residency training in gastroenterology at The University of Toronto. He received further subspecialty training in IBD and clinical nutrition at The University of Toronto and advanced endoscopy at The University of Mainz in Germany. He also received an M.Sc. degree in Clinical Epidemiology and Health Care Research from the University of Toronto. He currently holds a Tier II Faculty of Medicine Research Chair in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases from the University of Ottawa. His research program uses clinical and health administrative data to study the quality and effectiveness of clinical practice methods and to develop clinical prediction models for personalized medicine in the areas of IBD and gastrointestinal cancers

Dr. Weizman is a gastroenterologist at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, Ontario and an Associate  Professor of Medicine at the University of Toronto. He received his medical degree from the University of Manitoba and subsequently did a Residency in Internal Medicine and Fellowship in Gastroenterology at the University of Toronto. He completed the Advanced Fellowship in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California and a Master’s degree (MSc) in Quality Improvement and Patient Safety from the Institute of Health Policy, Evaluation, and Management at the University of Toronto.  His research interests include healthcare quality and health outcomes, with a focus on inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Dr. Weizman is the Medical Director of the Centre for Inflammatory Bowel Disease at Mount Sinai Hospital and Head of Quality and Patient Safety for the Division of Gastroenterology at Mount Sinai Hospital and the University Health Network.

Dr. Frank Hoentjen is a Gastroenterologist and Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of Gastroenterology at the University of Alberta. He completed his residencies and GI fellowship at the Free University Medical Center, Amsterdam, completed an advanced IBD fellowship at the University of Chicago, USA, and his PhD was awarded by the Free University Medical Center, Amsterdam following a research fellowship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA. In 2011 he joined the Gastroenterology faculty at the Radboud University Medical Center Nijmegen, The Netherlands until 2021.

Dr. Hoentjen was director of the Inflammatory Bowel Center and director of the GI clinical trial unit at the Radboud University Medical Center Nijmegen, The Netherlands. He was chair of the Initiative on Crohn and Colitis (ICC), the Dutch national organization for IBD research. Dr. Hoentjen founded and chaired the nation-wide Dutch IBD registry, IBDREAM. He was member of the IBD committee of the Dutch National Association for Gastroenterology (NVMDL) and the Dutch national IBD guideline committee in the Netherlands. His research aims include (1) optimization of immunosuppressive and biological therapies through clinical and translational studies, and (2) achieve a better understanding of the risk of colorectal cancer and dysplasia in IBD patients and improve surveillance strategies to prevent cancer.

Dr. Reena Khanna is an Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Western Ontario, and a Clinician Researcher in the Program for Experimental Medicine. She completed her MD and Internal Medicine residency at the University of Western Ontario, Gastroenterology fellowship at McMaster University. Dr. Khanna completed an advanced fellowship in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) at the Cleveland Clinic, followed by a research fellowship in international IBD clinical trials at the University of Western Ontario. She completed an MSc in clinical epidemiology at McMaster University. Her clinical and research interest are clinical trial design, new therapeutics, outcome measures. She has designed, conducted and published several studies, including the first cluster study in IBD. Dr. Khanna holds international grants and most recently was awarded the Crohn’s Colitis Canada’s rising star award for her research contributions.

Dr. Huang is an Assistant Professor and Clinician Investigator in the Division of Gastroenterology at Mount Sinai Hospital & the University of Toronto.  She completed medical school and internal medicine residency at Queen’s University, and Gastroenterology fellowship at the University of Toronto. Funded by Alberta Innovates Health Solutions clinician research fellowship, she obtained an Advanced IBD clinical research fellowship and Masters of Science (Medicine) at the University of Alberta, where she developed the Northern Alberta Preconception and Pregnancy in IBD clinical research program (2015 to 2017). After moving to Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto in 2017, she established the Preconception and Pregnancy in IBD clinical research program for Toronto and Ontario. Her primary clinical research interests include using multidisciplinary approaches and e-health strategies to incorporate P4 (predictive, preventive, participatory, personalized) medicine to optimize maternal, fetal, and neonatal outcomes in IBD, and conducting translational studies investigating the impact of maternal IBD and therapies on the fetus and neonate.