Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Sander Hitzig as the John C. and Sally Horsfall Eaton Chair in Rehabilitation Research, an academic position jointly shared between Sunnybrook and the University of Toronto’s Temerty Faculty of Medicine, for a five-year term.
The endowed Chair, first established in 2014, promotes rehabilitation research at Sunnybrook’s St. John’s Rehab.
“The generous support from this Chair will allow us to build upon and mentor the next generation of scientists to undertake innovative projects that will have a real-world impact on improving the health and wellbeing of patients recovering from a life-changing injury or illness,” says the incoming Chair, Dr. Hitzig, a senior scientist at Sunnybrook Research Institute.
As the Program Research Director at the St. John’s Rehab Research Program, Dr. Hitzig has built an internationally-recognized academic research program in disability, aging and rehabilitation; making significant contributions to the advancement of knowledge and policy, with a goal of remaining clinically responsive to the needs of patients as it also informs clinical practice.
His work examines the long-term outcomes of persons aging with a disability and/or other vulnerabilities, with a focus on three core populations: persons with limb loss, traumatic injury survivors, and older adults with complex care needs.
As an investigator on 195 research publications – 89 of which he was principal or senior responsible author – Dr. Hitzig’s research:
- evaluates the impact of disability on health and quality of life;
- identifies factors that promote health and social wellbeing in the community, and
- develops evidence-based strategies to optimize the delivery of integrated models of care.
Dr. Hitzig has mentored physicians, early-career scientists, and front-line clinicians with their own research and knowledge translation efforts, and has built collaborations across Sunnybrook campuses and beyond.
His academic roles include status appointments as an Associate Professor in the Department of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy and the Rehabilitation Sciences Institute with the Temerty Faculty of Medicine as well as in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto.
As the inaugural John C. and Sally Horsfall Eaton Chair in Rehabilitation Research, Dr. Larry Robinson, former program chief at St. John’s Rehab, led many discoveries during his tenure including demonstrating how patients who receive rehabilitation within the first eight days post-injury have shorter stays in acute care. He also recruited a critical mass of clinical researchers – psychiatrists, physiatrists and rehabilitation scientists – who have become Canadian leaders in a wide range of rehabilitation research.
The Eaton Family are longstanding supporters of rehabilitation research at Sunnybrook’s St. John’s Rehab. Their generosity has advanced academic rehabilitation science, resulting in policy change and new standards of care to help patients get back to their lives.