Canadian Task Force on Preventive Health Care

Putting Prevention Into Practice

Created and supported by the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), the Canadian Task Force on Preventive Health Care will provide independent, evidence-based advice and recommendations relating to disease prevention, early disease detection and good health promotion.

The Task Force is an independent panel of health professionals who are volunteering their special expertise in prevention and health promotion to create tools and resources that will help Canadians stay healthy. This panel of experts will meet several times each year to consider evidence on what helps prevent disease. They will use that evidence to create practical tools, resources and guidelines for both family doctors and other health care professionals to use with their patients and also for individual Canadians who want to prevent disease.

The Task Force is supported by an Office in the Centre for Chronic Disease Prevention and Control. A university-based Evidence Review and Synthesis Centre has been established to undertake evidence reviews and provide scientific support for the development of clinical practice guidelines. In addition, the Task Force will work with other health professional groups and organizations to support development of prevention tools to aid implementation of their recommendations.

Who will be interested in the work of the Task Force?

The primary target audience includes primary care health professionals (physicians, nurses, nurse practitioners). However, the work of the Task Force also impacts community and public health professionals (public health nurses, nutritionists), physician specialists, other health care and allied health professionals, policy makers, and Canadian citizens.

Membership

The membership of the Task Force includes a dynamic group of primary care and disease prevention experts from across Canada. This expert panel will consider the latest scientific evidence as the basis for the development of guidelines for prevention in primary care. 

Membership includes:

Chair/Vice-Chair

• Marcello Tonelli, MD, SM, FRCPC (Chair)
  Associate Professor of Nephrology, Department of Medicine, University of Alberta.
  Dr. Tonelli is also the Chair of the Canadian Society of Nephrology Clinical Practice Guidelines committee
• Richard Birtwhistle, MD, MSc , FCPC (Vice-Chair), Professor, Director, Centre for Studies in Primary Care, Queen’s University

Members

• Neil Bell MD, MSc, Professor, Department of Public Health Sciences University of Alberta
• Paula Brauer, PhD, RD, Registered Dietician, Associate Professor, Department of Family Relations and Applied Nutrition, Adjunct Professor, Department of Human Biology and Nutritional Sciences, University of Guelph
• James Dickinson, MBBS, PhD, CCFP, FRACGP Family Practitioner, Professor of Family Medicine and Community Health Sciences, University of Calgary
• Martin Fortin, MD, MSc, FCFP Family Practitioner, Director of Research, Department of Family Medicine, Université de Sherbrooke
• Michel Joffres, MD, MPH, PhD, Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences, Simon Fraser University, Adjunct Scientist, Cancer Control Research Department, BC Cancer Agency
• Patrice Lindsay, RN, PhD, Lecturer, Graduate Department of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, University of Toronto. 
• Patricia Parkin, MD, Associate Professor, Departments of Pediatrics and Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto
• Kevin Pottie, MD, MClSc, FCFP, Associate Professor, Departments of Family Medicine and Epidemiology and Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa
• Elizabeth Shaw MD, Associate Professor of Family Medicine, McMaster University
• Harminder Singh, MD, MPH, FRCPC, Assistant Professor of Medicine, Community Health Sciences and Section of Gastroenterology, University of Manitoba

More Information

• Information about the new Task Force and PHAC’s role

Contact Information