As an IMG,I had Master Degree in Internal Medicine 1988.Accepted as Internal Medicine Resident McMaster University, moved to Family Medicine Resident which is completed 2008.I completed the CCFP exam then worked as a Family Physician in Burlington 2009.I joined Oakville Trafalgar Memorial Hospital as a full time HOSPITALIST since 2010 until current date. I have been appointed as Associate Clinical Professor(Adjunct)2015.

Dr. Gina Agarwal is a Professor in the Departments of Family Medicine and Health Research Methods, Evidence and Impact and an Associate Professor in the Department of Health and Aging. She is a practicing Family Physician, Primary Care Epidemiologist, the McMaster Family Medicine Levitt Scholar, and the Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Vulnerable Individuals in Primary Care. She is a member of the McMaster Institute for Research on Aging and the McMaster Institute for Health Equity. Her research achievements have been recognized with the CIHR-IHSPR Article of the Year Award (2019), the prestigious Mid-Career Researcher Award from the North American Primary Care Research Group (2018), and an Award of Excellence from the College of Family Physicians of Canada (2016). As the Director of the Vulnerable Individuals in Primary Care (VIP) Research Lab, she focuses on improving primary health care access for vulnerable populations, ensuring people in need receive appropriate care at the right time and in the right place. As the Principal Investigator of the McMaster Community Paramedicine Research Team, she has driven health system change including the uptake of the innovative Community Paramedicine at Clinic (CP@clinic) program by 51% of Ontario Paramedic Services and its national (e.g. BCEHS) and international (e.g. UK, Australia) scale-up. She has worked extensively in social housing to improve the health of this vulnerable population and identify healthcare usage patterns. Her quantitative and qualitative research, including complex pragmatic studies, uses rigorous methods to produce novel insight into the unmet health needs of traditionally difficult-to-reach populations and determines cost-effective and targeted healthcare solutions nationally and globally. She regularly supervises undergraduate, master’s and doctoral students.

Special Interests: Unmet health needs of vulnerable populations (e.g. social housing residents), Quantitative and qualitative research methods (e.g. community-based RCTs including complex pragmatic studies and cost-effectiveness of community programming), Community Paramedicine, Social Housing, Diabetes, Cost-effective and targeted healthcare solutions, Community programming for the management of chronic health conditions, Low-cost primary care innovations in low and middle-income countries.

VIP Research Lab Website (https://vipresearchlab.ca/)

CP@clinic Website (https://cpatclinic.ca/)

Cheryl Allaby became part-time clinical faculty in the Department of Medicine, Geriatric Division, at McMaster University in the mid 2000’s. In 2010, she accepted a full-time academic position with the Department of Family Medicine and became an Associate Professor in 2015, stepping back to part-time in 2020. She is involved in teaching and clinical supervision of clinical clerks and residents and has tutored in the undergraduate MD program since 1999.

She completed Medical School at McMaster University in 1993. Prior to medicine, she was a physiotherapist employed primarily at St. Peter’s Hospital in the Geriatric Day Hospital, having developed a passion for working with older adults in her teen years.

After completing her Family Medicine Residency at McMaster University in 1995, she worked as a hospitalist in the Department of Geriatric Medicine at Hamilton Health Sciences for 24 years. She undertook a Family Medicine Hospitalist role at West Lincoln Memorial Hospital for 2 years following this. These days, she is at the Michael G. DeGroote Pain Clinic involved in chronic pain management and also with the Shelter Health Network of Hamilton. She completed a post-graduate certificate in chronic pain at the University of Alberta in 2022 and the IIWCC in wound care in 2018. Her interests are varied and include geriatric medicine, chronic pain, wound care, end of life care, addictions, homelessness and international health.

She was the Site Coordinator for the Juravinski Geriatric Teaching Unit from 2016-2020. Cheryl is committed to making learning fun and has developed interactive case-based tutorials for teaching geriatric topics, including falls, delirium and polypharmacy and learning sessions in wound care for Geriatric fellows. Cheryl also counts international health experiences in Jamaica and Uganda as enriching her life experience and maintains these connections.

Personally, she is married and together with her husband Chris, has 4 adult children and recently became a grandparent. Cheryl cultivates spirituality in her life, pursuing connectivity with God, humanity and nature. She enjoys outdoors activities including camping, biking and hiking in addition to reading, visual arts and playing board games.

Special Interests: Geriatric Medicine, Chronic Pain, Medical Education, Wound Care.