Our Team

Meet our Primary Trial Investigators and Trial Management

WINNIPEG

Dr. Ryan Zarychanski headshot

Dr. Ryan Zarychanski

Principal Investigator 
Health Sciences Centre

Dr. Zarychanski is a Professor, Critical Care physician, Hematologist, and Clinician-Scientist at the University of Manitoba and CancerCare Manitoba. He’s a senior scientist at the Research Institute of Oncology and Hematology and an affiliate member of the George and Fay Yee Centre for Healthcare Innovation. His research focuses on the hematologic aspects of critical illness where he leads several national and international randomized trials in the fields of sepsis and transfusion medicine.

Dr. Brett Houston

Principal Investigator 
Health Sciences Centre

Dr. Houston is an Assistant Professor, Hematologist, and Clinician-Scientist at the University of Manitoba and CancerCare Manitoba. Her PhD thesis focused on the use of tranexamic acid to reduce bleeding in non-cardiac surgeries at high-risk for red blood cell transfusion. Her ongoing research programs focus on supportive care strategies to reduce bleeding in patients at the time of surgery, and in patients with underlying blood cancers.  

Trial Statistician
The George and Fay Yee Centre for Healthcare Innovation

Robert Balshaw

Robert Balshaw is an Assistant professor in the department of community health sciences and a senior biostatistician in the Data Science Platform of the Georgy and Fay Yee Centre for Healthcare Innovation. He has been a consulting biostatistician for industry, government, and academia for 35 years and has been the lead statistician for dozens of clinical trials and consulted on hundreds of research projects.

Trial Management

753 McDermot Avenue
University of Manitoba
Winnipeg, MB R3E 0T6 Canada

Aurora Clinical Research

Dayna Solvason is a Research Project Manager with over 16 years of experience in academic and industry-sponsored clinical health research. She specializes in clinical trial operations of multi-center national and international clinical trials, including clinical trial agreements, and international clinical trial insurance requirements.

Dayna also provides strategic support to investigators and research teams in the development of competitive grant applications and funding proposals. Her contributions have helped secure more than $20 million in research funding, supporting innovative clinical research programs and advancing healthcare knowledge and patient outcomes both nationally and internationally.

Dayna.Solvason@umanitoba.ca.

Co-Director, Aurora Clinical Research 
TRACTION Trial; Clinical Trial Operations Manager

Dayna Solvason

OTTAWA

Dr. Dan McIsaac

Principal Investigator
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute

Dr. McIsaac is an anesthesiologist and CIHR-funded scientist who combines expertise in data science and clinical trials to improve the outcomes of older people having surgery. Primary focuses in Dr. McIsaac’s research include improving perioperative care for older people with frailty, assessing health system performance, and utilization of patient reported outcomes.

Dr. Dean Fergusson

Principal Investigator
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute

Dr. Fergusson is a Senior Scientist and Director of the Clinical Epidemiology Program at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and Full Professor in the Department of Medicine. His expertise spans transfusion medicine and innovative clinical trial methodology, having led landmark trials that shaped international blood management practices.

Dr. Breau is a Surgical Oncologist, Scientist, and Full Professor of Surgery at the University of Ottawa/Ottawa Hospital Research Institute. He serves on international guidelines committees for oncology and urology and leads several multicenter clinical trials. He also serves as surgical lead for the Canadian Kidney Cancer Information System, a national prospective cohort of over 18,000 patients.

Principal Investigator
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute

Dr. Rodney Breau

Dr. Ramsay holds a PhD in biostatistics and is a Senior Scientist with the Clinical Epidemiology Program at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and Associate Professor at the University of Ottawa. He is Scientific Director of the Ottawa Methods Centre, supporting clinical research across Ontario. He has authored 229 peer-reviewed publications and co-investigated grants totaling over $66 million.

Trial Statistician
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute

Tim Ramsey

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