New Platform Director, Evaluative Clinical Sciences

We are pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Natalie Coburn as the new platform director of Evaluative Clinical Sciences at Sunnybrook Research Institute (SRI), starting January 1st, 2022.

Dr. Coburn is currently a surgical oncologist and senior scientist in the Odette Cancer Program at Sunnybrook and professor in the departments of surgery and the Institute of Health Policy, Management, and Evaluation at the University of Toronto. She holds the Sherif and Mary Lou Hanna Chair in Surgical Oncology Research at Sunnybrook.

“Dr. Coburn’s combination of leadership qualities, dedication to mentorship and experience as a high-performing scientist make her ideally suited to lead the Evaluative Clinical Sciences Platform at SRI,” says Dr. Kullervo Hynynen, vice president of Research and Innovation at SRI.

Dr. Coburn’s research focuses on evaluating and improving the outcomes for patients who have gastrointestinal tract cancers. She has led several major grants examining patterns of care for the treatment of gastrointestinal cancers within Ontario and the United States, and has contributed internationally to guideline creation to improve processes of care. She currently serves as the Principal Investigator for a $2,000,000 CIHR-supported research project working to help provide patients with cancer personalized answers to questions about their disease and likely outcomes.

Following her training at the University of North Carolina, Brown University and Harvard University, Dr. Coburn completed her fellowship in hepato-pancreatico-biliary and upper gastrointestinal surgical oncology at the University of Toronto. She joined the Odette Cancer Centre at Sunnybrook in 2006, and has served in many leadership roles since then including as head of the division of general surgery, chief examiner for the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada’s Surgical Oncology fellowship examination, and clinical lead for Patient-Reported Outcomes and Symptom Management at Ontario Health-Cancer Care Ontario.

Outgoing platform director Dr. Don Redelmeier has been developing and leading the Evaluative Clinical Sciences Platform for over 25 years. “We would like to thank Dr. Redelmeier for his tremendous leadership for many years,” says Dr. Hynynen.

Please join us in thanking Dr. Redelmeier and congratulating Dr. Coburn.