James Anderson
Dalhousie, Philosophy Doctoral Fellow

My recent work has focused on the intersection of research ethics and the philosophy of science, exploring how the latter may enrich the former. My doctoral research will continue this project via an epistemological analysis of Freedman’s concept of clinical equipoise, a fundamental concept in the ethics of research. The requirements of clinical equipoise are both ethical and epistemological. However, the epistemological presuppositions upon which these requirements rest were neither made explicit nor argued for by Freedman. Identifying these presuppositions, and assessing them in light of recent work in epistemology and the philosophy of science, is the goal of my research.

Sharon Batt
Dalhousie, Bioethics Interdisciplinary Doctoral Fellow

My interests include the ethical and policy issues related to prescription drug promotion and questions that arise when patients become players in health care decision-making. My background includes earlier academic work in social and cognitive psychology, feminist and consumer rights journalism, women’s health policy research, and advocacy in the breast cancer movement. I have served on numerous ethics and health policy committees. For my dissertation research, I plan to study the funding of patient advocacy groups by pharmaceutical companies and the possible effects of these partnerships on health policy. Janice Graham is my supervisor.

Holly Longstaff
UBC, Independent Interdisciplinary Studies Graduate Program Doctoral Fellow

Holly is interested in experimenting with and evaluating new methods of risk communication and public engagement. Her mentors are Michael McDonald and Tim McDaniels. The objective of Holly's research is to help people make better health related decisions concerning complex technologies. The subjects she primarily focuses on are finfish aquaculture (genetically modified salmon, genetically modified salmon feeds) and pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD). How an individual processes information and their ultimate actions depend on many influences including knowledge of the issue, personal values, and the influence of norms. The communication materials Holly creates attempt to reflect the complex nature of these relationships. Learning more about the factors that influence an individual's decisions will help her to create a tool that reaches beyond the factual information model of communicating risk. The information gathered in her research should advance the study of risk communication generally while also informing standards and methods of risk communication with laypeople and experts on a range of health related issues for government departments like Health Canada.

Holly's most recent achievements include a Doctoral Research Award from the CIHR Institute of Genetics and a 2005/06 award from the Stichting Porticus Multidisciplinary Human Gene Technology, Research, and Therapy Project Scholarship Programme. Academic papers describing her work in the training program can be found in the Journal of Environmental Informatics, Environmental Science and Policy, The Health Law Review, the Journal of Integrated Assessment, and in a chapter from "Hindsight and Foresight on Emerging Technologies." She is also a proud member of the NERD research team, the NSF "Mitigation of Extreme Event Risks: The Case of Electric Power" project, and GenPos.

Nina Preto
UBC W. Maurice Young Centre for Applied Ethics Doctoral Fellow
Commencing September 2006

My recent research looks at the roles and challenges of research ethics boards from the board member’s perspective. As part of my doctoral studies, I plan to build on this research and look specifically at whether and how institutional conflict of interest impacts the ethics review process. My research will explore this issue from the perspectives of both research ethics board members and research subjects. My background is in law. Prior to pursuing graduate studies in bioethics, I practiced with a health law firm in Vancouver. I have extensive interest in both clinical and research ethics, and have served on research ethics boards and clinical ethics committees in both British Columbia and Alberta. I am a board member of the Provincial Health Ethics Network [“PHEN”]. I am currently working as the coordinator for a PHEN initiated collaborative effort to develop materials for the Alberta public on ethical issues that arise in the context of end of life decision making. I will be working primarily with Dr. McDonald and Dr. Cox during my doctoral studies at UBC.

Meredith Celene Schwartz
Dalhousie, Philosophy Doctoral Fellow

My interests are in philosophy specializing in ethics, feminist ethics, bioethics, health care ethics and policy. I am particularly interested in social justice and the differing impact of medical policy on vulnerable groups both nationally and internationally. I have been involved with public health education and outreach groups since junior high school and one of my objectives is to make ethical issues relevant and accessible to general and patient populations. My recent work on “Genetic Risk and Trust” won the Nathalie Des Rosiers Audacity of Imagination Award from the Law Commission of Canada. I am also the recipient of a 2006 Trudeau Foundation Scholarship. My supervisor is Dr. Susan Sherwin.

Victoria Seavilleklein
Dalhousie, Philosophy Doctoral Fellow

I am a PhD Candidate in the Philosophy Department, specializing in applied ethics, bioethics, and health care ethics and policy. My research focuses on the effects of health research and policy on issues of social justice, both nationally and globally, and especially where health care intersects with biotechnology and genetics. I have recently written about the use of embryos in research and advocated that controversial policy decisions be made in ways that take into account the interests of affected vulnerable and minority groups. My current research interest is in the medical conceptualization and treatment of intersexed infants and the dichotomous gender norms of society.

Lawrence Burns
Dalhousie, Post-doctoral Fellow

Lawrence Burns received his PhD from the University of Toronto in 2005. His dissertation explored relational models of embodied subjectivity, ethical responsibility and community. Lawrence's current research focuses on the impact that novel technologies in genetics and neurosciences have had on our self-understanding as human persons. He is particularly interested in the analysis of health policy regarding genetic interventions and stem cell research, with an emphasis on the role that human dignity plays in policy in Canada and comparatively. He is working at Dalhousie under the supervision of Françoise Baylis.

Marg Dorazio-Migliore
UBC W. Maurice Young Centre for Applied Ethics Post-doctoral Fellow

Building on my work on chronic illness, ethnicity, gender, and family care-provision to seniors, my current research, funded by the Hampton Foundation, focuses on the moral dimensions of chronic kidney disease. Specifically, I am completing a study of British Columbia families located in the Lower Mainland and the Interior affected by chronic renal disease. Emphasizing the role of place, I am also comparing and contrasting families affected by polycystic kidney disease (PKD) with those affected by non-hereditary kidney disease. My background in interdisciplinary studies and medical anthropology, together with bioethical insights, are permitting me to generate contextualized understandings of the moral and ethical aspects of increasingly complex family situations.

Chris Kaposy
Dalhousie, Post-doctoral Fellow
Commencing September 2006

I am a philosopher with an interest in abortion policy. Though the main question of the ethical permissibility of abortion has attracted much philosophical attention, other questions remain about the legal regulation, funding and administration of abortion (even where it is legal). My research approaches these issues from the perspective of philosophical ethics. I ask what an ethical abortion policy should look like, and what fundamental ethical considerations should inform such a policy. Should abortion be rare, as some have maintained? What legal restrictions, if any, are justified in the effort to make abortion rare? I wrote my doctoral dissertation on the moral standing of infants, and ethics of infanticide – (to which I am opposed). I also have interests in disability studies, end of life care, and the concept of vulnerability. I will be working with Dr Joceyln Downie while part of the training program.

Monique Lanoix
Dalhousie, Philosophy Post-doctoral Fellow

For several years, I have been involved in long-term or chronic care institutions both as a member of an ethics committee and a users’ committee. From this involvement, it became apparent to me that administrative and governmental policies often fail to address the real needs of such centres. My current research focuses on the policies regulating long-term or chronic care institutions in Canada. In particular, I want to examine the values implicit in these policies as well as the care practices prevalent in these types of centres. My goal is to examine whether the current practices effectively translate the values expressed in the relevant governmental policies. Traditionally overlooked by philosophers, such institutions merit theoretical consideration since they are designated sites of care, and they provide a unique opportunity to study the complexities of care and care practices. This research has both theoretical and practical aspects; the former relating to my previous work on the concept of the political person implicit in liberal democratic theories.

Ryan Melnychuk
Dalhousie, Bioethics Post-doctoral Fellow

Dr. Ryan Melnychuk obtained his B.Sc. (1999) in Microbiology and Immunology from the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon where he studied the molecular mechanisms of Murine Cytomegalovirus replication in the laboratory of Dr. Lambert Loh. After completing his undergraduate studies, he went on to complete a Ph.D. (2005) in Molecular Microbiology and Immunology at Oregon Health & Sciences University where he worked with Dr. Jay Nelson studying Human Cytomegalovirus accelerated long-term disease processes and the mechanisms of cellular signaling induced by viral-encoded chemokine receptors. Dr. Melnychuk is currently a postdoctoral fellow working with Dr. Nuala Kenny and Dr. Scott Halperin in the CIHR training program in Ethics of Health Research and Policy in the Department of Bioethics at Dalhousie University. Dr. Melnychuk is affiliated with the Health Policy and Translation Group at the Canadian Center for Vaccinology, Halifax (CCfV), and the Dalhousie Infectious Disease Research Alliance (DIDRA).

Dr. Melnychuk is currently involved in research linking bioethics and science through the development and application of ethical frameworks for public policy. His primary research is on the development of ethical frameworks that are conscious of good science (evidence based), are sensitive to issues of justice, and recognize social and historical factors that influence the emergence and persistence of infectious diseases. In addition to assisting in the drafting of ethical public policy, such frameworks will also facilitate ethical decision-making in the areas of public health and emerging infectious diseases including West Nile Virus and Pandemic Influenza. Finally, Dr. Melnychuk is working on the ethics component of the Nova Scotia Health Pandemic Influenza plan.

Bernie Pauly
Dalhousie, Post-doctoral Fellow

I am a registered nurse and nurse researcher interested in inequities in health and access to health care for those who are experiencing addiction, mental illnesses or homelessness. Those experiencing problematic substance use often face discrimination in accessing health care that negatively affects their health and limits access to health care services in spite of significant health care needs. Such inequities in health and access to health care are enacted in practice and in part are perpetuated and sustained by policy.

My primary focus in the post doctoral program is to develop sound theoretical knowledge of conceptions of justice and to develop skills in knowledge transfer with decision makers in order to enhance equitable policy and practice in health care organizations for those who are experiencing marginalization. My objectives are twofold. My first objective is to work with health care policy makers to identify inequities in policy and practice and to identify approaches/strategies for enacting justice in health care organizations. My second goal is to begin development of a program of research that will contribute to enhancing equity and justice in health care policy and practice for those experiencing marginalization. During the past year, my work has focused on clarifying conceptions of justice and public participation for the development of ethical frameworks for health policy. In addition, I have begun development of my ongoing program of research.

Anne Townsend
UBC W. Maurice Young Centre for Applied Ethics Post-doctoral Fellow

Anne’s specialist areas are medical sociology and qualitative research. She graduated from Lancaster University in 1989 with a BA in Sociology and gained an MA in Women's Studies at Exeter University in 1997. Her dissertation was on the constructions of masculinities and femininities in popular culture, and in particular, images of the ’healthy body’. She lectured in Further Education for six years, supervising and assessing Sociology and Health and Social Care students in their research projects. Anne then undertook her doctoral studies in the Social and Public Health Sciences Unit at the University of Glasgow, funded by the Medical Research Council. She gained her PhD in 2005. Her thesis was a qualitative study entitled ‘Multiple morbidity and moral identity in mid-life: accounts of chronic illness and the place of the GP consultation in overall management strategies’. From her research Anne developed an interest in the practical and moral work that people do in order to manage chronic illness in daily life, including the patient/practitioner relationship and medication use. Anne joined the Ethics of Health Research and Policy Training Program in January 2006, to work with Dr Susan Cox, a mentor in the Program. She is in the process of planning her research on the topic of moral dimensions of patient experiences with rheumatoid arthritis. She is currently exploring ideas about the potential ethical concerns of chronic illness health policies. Anne is also interested in the ethics of research involving humans.