About Us

Dr. Bradley Johnston

Dr. Bradley Johnston is the Director and Co-founder of NutriRECS, and is an Associate Professor with the Departments of Nutrition & Statistics, Texas A&M University, College Station, USA.

Dr. Johnston also holds adjunct appointments with the Department of Community Health & Epidemiology at Dalhousie University, as well as the Department of Health Research Methods at McMaster University, where he is a tutor in the annual Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Workshop. Dr. Johnston is an Associate Editor with BMC Medical Research Methods. His academic interests include the methodology of patient-reported outcome measures, randomized trials, meta-analysis (including aggregate, network and individual patient data synthesis), as well as clinical and dietary practice guidelines. His work involves the application of these methods to a wide range of areas, with a particular interest in the education, principles and practice of evidence-based nutrition. He has published over 120 peer-reviewed articles, including first and senior authored articles in JAMA, BMJ, Annals of Internal Medicine, CMAJ and Cochrane.

Dr. Pablo Alonso-Coello

Dr. Pablo Alonso-Coello is a Co-founder of NutriRECS, the Head of the Barcelona GRADE center, and is a Health Services Researcher at the Biomedical Research Institute (Hospital Sant Pau) in Barcelona, Spain.

He has extensive experience in clinical practice guidelines development and methodology, systematic reviews and randomised clinical trials. In the field of guideline methodology he has played an important role in the development of the GRADE approach to guideline development, which has been adopted internationally. In Spain he is the Director of the Scientific Committee of the National Program of Clinical Practice Guidelines, and has been providing support to numerous guideline organizations. He is a member of the GRADE guidance group. In 2017 he was identified as a highly cited researcher of the last decade (http://hcr.stateofinnovation.thomsonreuters.com/).

Dr. Malgorzata (Gosia) Bala

Dr. Malgorzata (Gosia) Bala is a Co-founder of NutriRECS, the Head of the Cochrane Poland, and the Chair of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine at the Jagiellonian University Medical College, Cracow, Poland.

For over 15 years Dr. Bala has been involved in systematic reviews, health technology assessment and practice guideline methodology. Her long-term involvement in Cochrane activities resulted in establishing Cochrane Poland in 2014. For several years she has been a tutor of evidence-based medicine (EBM) to medical students at the Jagiellonian University Medical College and co-authored the chapters in the referential Polish textbook: “The Essentials of Evidence-Based Medicine for Physicians and Medical Students”(Editors: Piotr Gajewski, Roman Jaeschke, Jan Brozek; Cracow, 2008). Recently she has become as tutor of EBM to students of dietetics and a tutor of methods of systematic reviews to researchers and PhD students. Her research activities are focused on evidence-based medicine and public health, particularly on the systematic reviews assessing effectiveness of therapeutic interventions, including several Cochrane reviews, as well as the methodological aspects of clinical trials and treatment guidelines. She is also involved in applying systematic reviews methods in non-medical fields, like bioethics, human resources.

Dr. Gordon Guyatt

Dr. Gordon Guyatt coined the term “evidence-based medicine”, is a mentor, Clinician-Scientist and Distinguished Professor in the Department of Health Research Methods (formally Clinical Epidemiology & Biostatistics) at McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada.

Dr. Guyatt is a pioneer in evidence-based medicine and an internationally renowned expert in health research methodology, having published over 1000 peer-reviewed articles. Has has led the production of a series of over 35 articles “Users’ Guides to the medical literature”, published in JAMA. These materials have played a key role in establishing EBM as a core aspect of undergraduate and postgraduate medical education worldwide. He is the Co-Chair of the GRADE working group, a system for rating the quality of evidence from systematic reviews and making recommendations for clinical and public health guidelines. GRADE has been adopted by over 100 organization worldwide including the World Health Organization, the Cochrane Collaboration, the American College of Physicians, and UpToDate.

Dr. Per Vandvik

Dr. Per Vandvik is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health Management and Health Economics, University of Oslo, Norway, and founder and director of the MAGIC (Making GRADE the Irresistible Choice) research and innovation program

He is also researcher at the Norwegian Knowledge Centre for the Health Services in Oslo and an acting consultant at the Department of Medicine, Innlandet Hospital Trust-Gjøvik, Norway. The MAGIC research and innovation program aims to provide clinicians and patients with trustworthy evidence summaries, guidelines and decision aids at the point of care. Supported by a career research grant from Helse Sør-Øst RHF and several innovation grants this work includes the MAGIC authoring and publication platform and innovative solutions for decision aids and integrating guidelines in the electronic medical record linked to patient specific data. Dr. Vandvik is also a recognized teacher in evidence-based medicine and guideline methodology for clinicians and decision-makers in health care. He is a member of the GRADE working group and is a member of the Guidelines International Network (GIN) Board of Trustees. He currently supports numerous guideline organizations in developing trustworthy guidelines, and leads a collaboration with the BMJ in producing RapidRecs guidelines as new evidence emerges.

Dr. Robin Vernooij

Dr. Robin Vernooij is an Epidemiologist and Post-Doctoral Researcher at the University Medical Centre Utrecht, affiliated Researcher at Cochrane Netherlands, and a Research Associate with NutriRECS.

Dr. Vernooij’s research interests include the development and updating of clinical guidelines, systematic reviews and meta-analyses (including network meta-analyses and individual patient data meta-analyses), and population-based cancer registry studies (with a special focus on urologic cancers). He holds a master’s degree in epidemiology and biostatistics at the VU University Amsterdam, and a PhD in the Methodology of Biomedical Research and Public Health from the Universitat Autonoma of Barcelona (with international mention). He has research experience in different internationally recognized centres including the Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Organization, the Biomedical Research Institute at Hospital Sant Pau and Oxford University.

Dr. Russell de Souza

Dr. Russell de Souza is a Registered Dietitian, Nutrition Epidemiologist and an Associate Professor with the Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence and Impact, McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada.

Dr. de Souza’s current research interests lie in advancing methodology for systematic reviews and meta-analysis and clinical trials in the field of nutrition, with an interest in the contribution of dietary patterns and macronutrients (specifically fructose, saturated, and trans fats) to cardiovascular disease risk throughout the lifespan. He is a co-investigator on the INMD-funded Birth Cohort Alliance, which seeks to explore associations among maternal nutrition, infant feeding patterns, and epigenetic/epigenomic determinants of maternal and child health, as well as the Alliance for Healthy Hearts and Minds cohort examining neighbourhood-level factors that contribute to cardiovascular risk. He is also interested in the reproducibility and validity of current methods of assessing nutrient intakes. He has served as an external resource person to the World Health Organization’ Nutrition Guidelines Advisory Committee on saturated, trans, and polyunsaturated fatty acids.

Dr. Celeste Naude

Dr. Celeste Naude is a Registered Dietician at the Centre for Evidence-based Health Care at Stellenbosch University, South Africa; and Co-Director of Cochrane Nutrition.

Dr. Naude is also an Associate Editor of Nutrition Journal (BMC), and Co-convenor of the Cochrane Fields Executive and is a member of the Cochrane Council. She is an invited member of the Chronic Disease Initiative for Africa. Nationally, Celeste serves on the Ministerial Committee on Mortality and Morbidity in Children under 5-years; and provincially on the Western Cape Technical Reference Group on Health Eating. Celeste holds a PhD in Nutritional Sciences, with formal training in Cochrane systematic review methods, GRADE guideline development, systematic review editing skills, SUPPORT summaries and science communication. Through Cochrane and other collaborative multi-stakeholder initiatives, she is involved in preparing systematic reviews, meta-analyses, knowledge translation strategies, policy briefs, scoping reviews for guideline development, as well as relevant primary research.

Dr. Lehana Thabane

Dr. Lehana Thabane is a Professor of Biostatistics and Associate Chair of the Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact at McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada. He is also the Director of Biostatistics at St Joseph’s Healthcare in Hamilton.

In addition to his leadership roles at McMaster University, Dr. Thabane holds visiting professorships at the University of Cape Town and Stellenbosch University in South Africa, and at UNESP in Brazil. His research interests include clinical trial methods, analysis and execution; pilot and feasibility studies and systematic review methodology. He is the Co-Editor-in-Chief of BMC Pilot and Feasibility Studies and is an editorial board member for BMC Trials, and Clinical Trials. He has mentored over 100 MSc, PhD and Postdoc trainees including over 15 junior faculty from various institutions. He won several teaching and supervision awards and he is the clinical trials mentor for the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and CIHR Drug Safety and Effectiveness Cross-disciplinary Training (DSECT) Program. He has co-authored over 600 publications in peer-reviewed journals and over 700 abstracts presented at national and international meetings with over 100 invited presentations.

Dr. Mi Ah Han

Dr. Mi Ah Han is a Professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine, Chosun University, Republic of Korea.

Dr. Han’s work focuses on epidemiology, preventive medicine and the education about health research methods and evidence-based healthcare. Her research interests include public health, community-based intervention and health research methodology. She has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles using primary and secondary data analysis as well as systematic review and meta-analysis. Her current research focuses on the summarizing evidence of the health effect (primarily cancer) of risk factors using a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Dr. Joshua Goldenberg

Dr. Joshua Goldenberg is a clinician, passionate patient advocate, and a leading teacher and researcher in the field of naturopathic and integrative medicine, emphasizing the principles of evidence-based clinical practice and optimal evidence synthesis research methods.

His research focus includes functional and irritable bowel syndrome, probiotics, dietary patterns, evidence-informed practice, and applied research methodology. He is Research Investigator at the Helfgott Research Institute, National University of Natural Medicine and a Visiting Research Scholar at the University of Technology Sydney. He has presented nationally and internationally on evidence-based clinical practice as well as probiotics and optimizing protocol-driven research methodology.

Dr. Long Ge

Dr. Long Ge is a Researcher at the Evidence-Based Social Science Research Center, School of Public Health, Lanzhou University, China. He is also a core member of the WHO Collaborating Center for Guideline Implementation and Knowledge Translation and the GRADE Chinese Center.

With a PhD in public health, Dr. Long has been a visiting scientist in meta-epidemiology with Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact, McMaster University, Canada. He works with Drs Johnston and Guyatt on evidence synthesis methods applied to nutrition topics. He is also an Associate Editor with BMC Systematic Reviews. His research interests include optimal methods for systematic reviews and meta-analyses, network meta-analyses, and clinical practice guidelines. His work involves the application of these methods to a wide range of areas, including nutrition, surgery, oncology, Traditional Chinese Medicine as well as the social sciences such as management, economics, and education. He is working on an application and database to disseminate and translate high-quality, trusted nutrition evidence in China. He has published over 70 peer-reviewed articles, including first and corresponding authored articles in BMJ, Sleep Medicine Reviews, International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, and the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology.

Dena Zeraatkar

Dena Zeraatkar is a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) funded PhD candidate in the Health Research Methodology (HRM) program in the Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact (HEI) at McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada.

Her master’s work centered on methods for the validation and use of the Early Development Instrument (EDI) for children with special needs. Her doctoral work focuses on advancing research methods in nutrition, particularly related to systematic reviews and guideline development. She has received graduate-level awards for her master’s and doctoral work from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR).

Dr. Montserrat Rabassa

Dr. Montserrat Rabassa is a Nutritionist and a Sara Borrell Post-Doctoral Researcher at the Biomedical Research Institute (Hospital Sant Pau), Barcelona, Spain.

Dr. Rabassa’s main research activity is focused on improving the quality and implementability of nutritional recommendations. She has degree in Human Nutrition and Dietetics from the Rovira i Virgili University (2006) and in Food Science and Technology from the University of Barcelona (2009). She holds an Official Masters in Food Development and Innovation (2011) and a PhD in Food and Nutrition, with European mention, from the University of Barcelona (2015). She received a PhD Extraordinary Award for the 2015-2016 academic year for her thesis entitled “Effect of polyphenol-rich diet intake on aging: Association with physical and cognitive decline, frailty and total mortality within the InCHIANTI cohort”.

Claudia Valli

Claudia Valli is a Researcher at the Biomedical Research Institute (Hospital Sant Pau) and a PhD Candidate in the Methodology of Biomedical Research and Public Health Program at the Univeristat Autonoma of Barcelona, Spain.

Claudia’s work focuses on conducting clinical and nutritional systematic reviews and synthetizing research evidence to support informed decision-making and guideline development. She has a masters in Nutrition and Health from Wageningen University (Netherlands) with the specialization in “Epidemiology and Public Health”. Her master’s work focused on developing methods for process evaluation plans in nutritional programs among the elderly.

Jhalok Ronjan Talukdar

Jhalok Ronjan Talukdar has background training in public health, ethics and qualitative methods, and is a PhD student in the Health Research Methodology (HRM) program at McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada. His PhD research aims to contribute to better assessing the potential harms and benefits related to dietary fat intake.

Jhalok works under the supervision of Drs Bradley Johnston and Lehana Thabane. He is also a senior research associate (currently on study leave) at James P. Grant School of Public Health at BRAC University, Bangladesh. His research interests include systematic review and meta-analysis, network meta-analysis, analysis of correlated data and mixed methods study design.

Dr. Qin Guo

Dr. Qin Guo is a Pediatrician-Scientist at West China Second Hospital of Sichuan University, Chengdu, China.

Her research is focused on improving the quality of clinical research in pediatrics in China, particularly related to the methodological development of systematic reviews and clinical practice guidelines that evaluate the potential for probiotic administration among children with infectious diseases.

Dr. Behnam Sadeghirad

Dr. Behnam Sadeghirad is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anesthesia and Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence and Impact (formerly known as Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics) at McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada.

Dr. Sadeghirad’s research interests include methodology of systematic reviews and meta-analyses, network meta-analyses, evidence-based practice and biostatistics. He has research experience with a number of well-established centres including McMaster Universities Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Pain Research and Care, and the WHO Collaborating Centre for HIV Surveillance at Kerman University, Iran.

Dr. Regina El Dib

Dr. Regina El Dib is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biosciences and Oral Diagnosis, Institute of Science and Technology, Estadual Paulista University, Brazil, and founder and director of the systematic review unit of the Botucatu Medical School, registered in the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).

Dr. El Dib’s graduate training is in evidence-based medicine and her work focuses on clinical epidemiology methods. She has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles, primarily involving systematic reviews of interventional, prognostic and diagnostic accuracy studies, as well as research on evidence synthesis methods. She has extensive experience with Cochrane reviews, including having managed Cochrane Brazil’s Project Health in Your Language that has translated over 250 review abstracts to Portuguese. She is also an adjunct researcher with the McMaster Institute of Urology in Canada, collaborating on a number of primary and secondary studies in kidney cancer.

"Trusted Nutritional Recommendations"

LEADERSHIP TEAM

Dr. Bradley Johnston

Dr. Pablo Alonso-Coello

Dr. Malgorzata (Gosia) Bala

Dr. Gordon Guyatt

COLLABORATING TEAM

Dr. Per Vandvik

Dr. Robin Vernooij

Dr. Russell de Souza

Dr. Celeste Naude

Dr. Lehana Thabane

Dr. Mi Ah Han

Dr. Joshua Goldenberg

Dr. Long Ge

TRAINEE TEAM

Dena Zeraatkar

Dr. Montserrat Rabassa

Claudia Valli

Jhalok Ronjan Talukdar

ALUMNI

Dr. Qin Guo

Dr. Behnam Sadeghirad

Dr. Regina El Dib

CONTACT INFO

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NEWS & EVENTS

Season 1 Episode 7: Exploring Pilot and Feasibility Studies with Dr. Lehana Thabane

Season 1 Episode 6: Training Research Methodologists with Dr. Lehana Thabane

Season 1 Episode 5: The Principles of Proof with Dr. Dennis Bier

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