Our Team

Investigative Team

Maureen Dobbins, RN, PhD

(Primary Investigator), joined the School of Nursing as an Assistant Professor in 1999 and received tenure and promotion to Associate Professor, July 1, 2006. She holds a cross appointment with the School of Rehabilitation Sciences. Since joining the School of Nursing, Maureen has received two training awards (the National Health Research, Development Program, and the Canadian Health Services Research Foundation), and received the Canadian Policy Research Award: Graduate Student Prize for her dissertation. She currently holds a five-year career scientist award from the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care.

Maureen has concentrated her research efforts on understanding knowledge transfer and exchange and evidence-informed decision making among public health decision makers in Canada. Her program of research has sought to: identify barriers to knowledge transfer and exchange among public health decision makers; identify factors facilitating the use of the results of systematic reviews for program decision making; understand the information needs of public health decision makers at the local, provincial and federal level; evaluate the use of systematic reviews in the development of new provincial guidelines for public health practice; understand the program planning decision-making process of public health organizations to determine where research evidence fits into the process; evaluate knowledge transfer and exchange strategies through the use of a randomized controlled trial, and explore the knowledge broker role as it is naturally occurring in public health units in Ontario.

The most significant product from her research has been the development and launch on March 10, 2005 of this web site www.health-evidence.ca, a registry housing all reviews evaluating the effectiveness of public health and health promotion interventions published since 1985. The value of this registry is that it meets the need for a single source of high quality effectiveness evidence in public health/health promotion; a need clearly articulated by Canadian public health decision makers. Health-evidence.ca forms the backbone of a comprehensive, national knowledge transfer and exchange strategy that is being implemented and evaluated on public health decision makers at all levels across Canada. Efforts are ongoing to continually improve this site and work collaboratively with public health decision makers to facilitate evidence-informed public health practice.

Donna Ciliska, RN, PhD

(Co-investigator), is a Professor, McMaster University, and Scientific Co-Director of the National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools. She is currently interested in the synthesis, transfer and uptake of research findings by clinicians and policy-makers. Dr. Ciliska is editor of the journal, Evidence-Based Nursing, which is also targeted to increasing uptake of high quality evidence to clinicians and policy-makers. In addition, she conducts workshops for clinicians and educators around the world related to evidence-informed health care.

Roy Cameron

(Co-investigator), trained at the University of Waterloo (MA, English; PhD, Clinical Psychology) and Duke University Medical Center (Internship). He is Executive Director of the Canadian Cancer Society / National Cancer Institute of Canada’s Centre for Behavioural Research and Program Evaluation (CBRPE), and Professor of Health Studies and Gerontology, University of Waterloo. He has received numerous awards, including Fellowship status in the Society of Behavioral Medicine. Dr. Cameron’s career has focused on tobacco control research. He is now concerned primarily with building population intervention research capacity in Canada. The goal is to enable the generation and use of timely, relevant, rigorous evidence to inform and continually improve population level policies and programs that a) prevent cancer (and other diseases), and b) improve the quality of life of people affected by cancer. To establish an environment that enables impact oriented population intervention studies, Dr. Cameron has helped to instigate a number of initiatives, including the Canadian Tobacco Control Research Initiative (sponsored by CIHR, Health Canada, the Canadian Cancer Society and the National Cancer Institute of Canada to fund population intervention studies), and Population Health Intervention Research Initiative for Canada (led by the CIHR Institutes of Population and Public Health, and Nutrition Metabolism and Diabetes; the Public Health Agency of Canada; the Chronic Disease Prevention Alliance of Canada; the Canadian Population Health Initiative; and CBRPE).

Shawna L. Mercer, MSc, PhD

Shawna L. Mercer, MSc, PhD is the Director of the Guide to Community Preventive Services (Community Guide), in the National Center for Health Marketing at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The Community Guide works with its partners and stakeholders both inside and outside of CDC to conduct and disseminate systematic reviews of the effectiveness of community, environmental, population, and healthcare system interventions in public health and health promotion. These systematic reviews form the basis of recommendations for public health practice, policy, and research that are made by the Task Force on Community Preventive Services—an independent body of leaders in public health practice, policy, and research, convened by the US Department of Health and Human Services and appointed by the CDC Director. Dr. Mercer’s research focuses on bridging gaps between research and practice and policy, with special interest in strengthening the rigor of participatory research and assessing its value and benefits for bridging research and practice.

Steve Manske

(Co-investigator), is a Scientist at the Centre for Behavioural Research and Program Evaluation and a Research Assistant Professor in Applied Health Sciences at the University of Waterloo. He focuses on increasing the effective use of knowledge generated from science and practice. In collaboration with other researchers, decision-makers and students, he creates and tests tools and processes for knowledge synthesis, translation, and exchange, as well as evaluation. He trained at the University of Toronto (EdD in Adult Education) and University of Waterloo (MSc in Health Behaviour). Dr. Manske focuses on youth studies and heads the development and implementation of the School Health Action, Planning and Evaluation System or SHAPES. SHAPES can collect health behaviour data from all students in a school, which can then be used to create a computer-generated “health profile” of the school. Data can also be aggregated regionally, provincially or nationally to identify trends and evaluate initiatives. SHAPES is currently used to aid intervention planning, evaluation, surveillance, and research (and integration of these activities) across Canada. Current highlights of Dr. Manske’s work include directing the 2006-2007 Youth Smoking Survey (YSS). The fourth national survey of youth smoking, the 2006-2007 Youth Smoking Survey is collecting data in 324 schools (grades 5 to 12). Dr. Manske previously edited a technical report on the Youth Smoking Survey – 2002. A complementary survey conducted in New Brunswick will use SHAPES technology to survey all students, grades 5 to 12 regarding smoking, physical activity, healthy eating and mental health (200 schools, 80,000 students). Work is underway to validate a healthy eating module, and ensure its content is relevant to policy and program indicators needed in Canada and its provinces. Similar work is underway for indicators of youth cessation. Dr. Manske has also established a knowledge exchange project that builds capacity among community stakeholders (e.g., education, public health) to make use of SHAPES data.

Steve Hanna, PhD

(Co-investigator), is an Associate Professor in the Department of Clinical Epidemiology & Biostatistics, and the School of Rehabilitation Science at McMaster University. He has expertise and interests in biostatistics, childhood disability, knowledge translation, and social psychology. His interests include the analysis of longitudinal data and the application of multilevel and structural equation models in health services and child development. He is also involved with research in the evaluation and perceptions of clinical practice guidelines. He is a member of the CanChild Centre for Childhood Disability Research, the AGREE Collaboration, and a statistical consultant to the Program in Evidence Based Care, Cancer Care Ontario.

Linda O’Mara, RN, PhD

(Co-investigator), is an Associate Professor in the School of Nursing at McMaster University, a researcher with the Systems Linked Research Unit (SLRU), and clinical associate with the City of Hamilton Public Health and Community Services. She has taught extensively in the undergraduate program, with a clinical focus on pediatrics and community health. She completed her doctoral degree with a focus on health promotion with adolescents. Linda has conducted research evaluating the effectiveness of a competency-based program for high risk inner city elementary school students. She is currently investigating the effectiveness of a mental health promotion program for adolescents. She is interested and knowledgeable about chronic disease prevention, health promotion relating to physical activity and healthy body weights in children, and mental health programs for children. She recognizes the importance of knowledge translation strategies to improving the incorporation of research evidence into policy and program planning decisions.