Kumanan Wilson
MD, MSc, FRCPC
Senior Investigator
Interim CEO and Chief Scientific Officer
Bruyère Research Institute
Vice President, Research & Academic Affairs
Bruyère Continuing Care
Chief Scientific Officer
CANImmunize Inc.
Professor and Clinical Research Chair in Digital Health Innovation
University of Ottawa
General Internal Medicine Staff Physician and Senior Scientist
The Ottawa Hospital
Scholar
O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law, Georgetown University
About:
Dr. Kumanan Wilson is the Interim CEO and Chief Scientific Officer, Bruyère Research Institute and Vice President Research & Academic Affairs, Bruyère. He had previously served as an innovation advisor for Bruyère, supporting the development of an innovation agenda to help implement commercial solutions in healthcare.
Dr. Wilson is also a specialist in General Internal Medicine at The Ottawa Hospital and Full Professor and Faculty of Medicine Clinical Research Chair in Digital Health Innovation at the University of Ottawa. He is also a member of the University of Ottawa’s Centre for Health Law, Policy and Ethics.
He is the co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of CANImmunize, a science-based technology company specializing in immunization software. Dr. Wilson and his team developed a pan-Canadian digital immunization tracking system, to help Canadians keep track of their vaccinations.
His research on immunization has explored social media’s impact on vaccine hesitancy, evaluation of vaccine safety using health services data, and vaccine policy, including advocating for vaccine injury compensation, which led to the introduction of Canada’s Vaccine Injury Support Program.
He has received support from multiple organizations including the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the World Health Organization (WHO), The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Canada’s Immunity Task Force.
Research Interests:
Digital health, immunization, pandemic preparedness, public health policy, innovation, blood safety and newborn screening, health ethics, law and policy.
Select Publications:
Bota AB, Bettinger JA, Sarfo-Mensah S, Lopez J, Smith DP, Atkinson KM, Bell C, Marty K, Serhan M, Zhu DT, McCarthy AE, Wilson K. (2023). Comparing the use of a mobile app and a web-based notification platform for surveillance of adverse events following influenza immunization: Randomized controlled trial. JMIR Public Health and Surveillance.
Chassé M, Fergusson DA, Tinmouth A, Acker JP, Perelman I, Tuttle A, English SW, Hawken S, Forster AJ, Shehata N, Thavorn K, Wilson K, Cober N, Maddison H, Tokessy M. (2023). Effect of donor sex on recipient mortality in transfusion. New England Journal of Medicine.
Grewal R, Nguyen L, Buchan SA, Wilson SE, Nasreen S, Austin PC, Brown KA, Fell DB, Gubbay JB, Schwartz KL, Tadrous M, Wilson K, Kwong JC. (2023). Effectiveness of mRNA COVID-19 vaccine booster doses against Omicron severe outcomes. Nature Communications.
Wilson K, Wilson LA, Rusk KT, Henry JL, Denize KM, Hsu AT, Sveistrup H. (2023). Digital immunization tracking in long-term care and assisted living facilities. Canadian Journal on Aging.
Wilson K, Bell C, Wilson L, Witteman H. (2018). Agile research to complement agile development: a proposal for an mHealth research lifecycle. NPJ Digital Medicine.
Contact:
kwilson@toh.ca