The CAN-PROTECT Team

Dr. Zahinoor Ismail

Clinician Scientist and Professor of Psychiatry, Neurology, Epidemiology, and Pathology; Hotchkiss Brain Institute and O’Brien Institute for Public Health; Cumming School of Medicine; University of Calgary - CAN-PROTECT Principal Investigator

Dr. Ismail is a Clinician Scientist and Professor of Psychiatry, Neurology, Epidemiology, and Pathology at the Hotchkiss Brain Institute and O’Brien Institute for Public Health, at the University of Calgary. He has certification in Behavioral Neurology & Neuropsychiatry, and Geriatric Psychiatry, and has over 20 years of clinical experience. Dr. Ismail Chairs the Canadian Consensus Conference on the Diagnosis and Treatment of Dementia, which generates clinical dementia guidelines, and the Canadian Conference on Dementia, Canada’s biennial dementia clinical and research meeting. His research program encompasses: i) rating scale development and measurement-based care; ii) epidemiology and diagnosis of neurocognitive disorders; iii) nosology, assessment, and management of non-cognitive markers of dementia; iv) neuroimaging and biomarker studies of dementia and predementia syndromes; and v) dementia clinical trials. His research has been funded by Brain Canada, the Canadian Consortium on Neurodegeneration in Aging, and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

Dr. Pam Roach

Assistant Professor, Departments of Family Medicine and Community Health Sciences; Cumming School of Medicine

Dr. Roach is an Assistant Professor in the Departments of Family Medicine and Community Health Sciences at the University of Calgary and is also the Director, Indigenous health education in the Office of Indigenous, Local and Global Health for the Cumming School of Medicine. She is a PhD health researcher and member of the Métis Nation of Alberta who has worked in a variety of academic and community health care settings, both in Canada and the UK, over the last 18 years. Her research focuses on Indigenous health; brain health and dementia in underserved populations; and developing anti-racism educational interventions.

Dr. Eric Smith

Professor of Neurology and Katthy Taylor Chair in Vascular Dementia, Cumming School of Medicine, University of Calgary

Dr. Smith is a Professor of Neurology, Radiology, and Community Health Sciences at the University of Calgary, and the holder of the endowed Katthy Taylor Chair in Vascular Dementia. He sees patients with stroke and dementia at Foothills Hospital and the South Health Campus. He is the Medical Director of the Cognitive Neurosciences Clinic which evaluates patients with symptoms of poor memory and cognition. Dr. Smith graduated from McGill University, trained in Neurology in teaching hospitals of Harvard Medical School, and was Assistant Professor of Neurology at Harvard University before coming to Calgary in 2008. His research team investigates how brain blood vessel diseases can increase risk of dementia. He leads the Dementia and Cognitive Disorders NeuroTeam at the Hotchkiss Brain Institute at the University of Calgary. In the course of his work he has collaborated or advised several national organizations including the Alzheimer Society of Canada, Alzheimer Society of Calgary, Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, and the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Dylan Guan

Medical Science PhD Student, University of Calgary

Dylan is a Medical Science PhD student specializing in Medical Imaging under the supervision of Dr. Zahinoor Ismail at the University of Calgary. He received his Honours Bachelor of Science with a Neuroscience Major, Psychology Minor, and Physiology Minor from the University of Toronto. He is also the Member-in-Training representative for the Alzheimer Association International Society to Advance Alzheimer Research and Treatment (ISTAART) Neuropsychiatric Syndromes Professional Interest Area. Dylan’s research focuses on the relationship between cognitive, behavioural, and sensorimotor markers of dementia and the changes in the brain that underlie them. He will be using CAN-PROTECT data for his research and will provide email support to CAN-PROTECT participants.

Daniella Vellone

Medical Science PhD Student, University of Calgary

Daniella is a Medical Science and Imaging doctoral student supervised by Dr. Zahinoor Ismail at the University of Calgary. She completed her Honours Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology with a minor in Neuroscience at the University of Guelph. She is affiliated with the Cumming School of Medicine and is a trainee at the Hotchkiss Brain Institute. Her work explores mild behavioural impairment-apathy in dementia-free older adults by implementing a research framework that focuses on dementia-related epidemiological, neuroimaging, and pathological biomarker changes. She will be using data collected in CAN-PROTECT for her own research and will also be providing email support to CAN-PROTECT participants.

Ramnik Brar BSc

Ramnik is a Research Coordinator at the University of Calgary. Her education includes a Bachelor of Science degree with a specialization in Pharmacology. She has over 10 years of experience in research, coordinating observational and interventional studies. Currently, she is working on several studies assessing neuropsychiatric symptoms associated with Dementia. She has been instrumental in obtaining ethics approval and getting CAN-PROTECT up and running.

Dr Byron Creese

Senior Lecturer in Neuroscience, University of Exeter Medical School, UK

Dr. Creese's work focuses on understanding the biology, clinical consequences and treatment of neuropsychiatric symptoms (e.g. hallucinations, suspicious thoughts, apathy) occurring in later life and dementia. He has led some of the UK's first work into Mild Behavioural Impairment, a novel framework which describes a spectrum of neuropsychiatric symptoms which may, for some, be the very first noticeable sign of neurodegenerative disease. Byron oversees the genomics data of PROTECT.

Professor Anne Corbett

Associate Professor of Dementia Research & PROTECT UK Study Lead; University of Exeter Medical School, UK

Dr. Corbett is the academic lead for the PROTECT study at the University of Exeter. Her research focuses on cognitive health in aging and how dementia might be prevented in older adults. She has a wide portfolio of dementia research ranging from online studies into risk reduction, drug discovery, clinical trials and care home research. She has published over 80 research papers and has authored leading clinical guidance on dementia care.

Professor Clive Ballard

Professor of Age-Related Diseases; Deputy Pro-Vice-Chancellor and Dean of the University of Exeter Medical School, UK

Prof. Ballard specialises in the psychiatry of older adults. Across his career his research has ranged from prevention of dementia, exploring biological mechanisms and drug discovery through to understanding the needs of people with more severe dementia living in care homes and the overuse and harms of anti-psychotic medication in these individuals. He developed the PROTECT study to drive forward research into prevention and risk reduction. Clive has published over 200 research papers including multiple clinical trials, and has played a major role in changing dementia care policy in the UK and further afield.