Dr. Jim Lewis has been appointed as Clinical Research Training Director

I am pleased to announce that Dr. Jim Lewis has been appointed as Clinical Research Training Director, Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, Western University.

The Clinical Research Training Director position was created to have a lead faculty member responsible for the management of the clinical research training programs, mentoring and career development of the trainees in the programs at the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry.

Dr. Lewis completed his medical degree in 1982 at Western University’s medical school, the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry and his residency training in Internal Medicine in 1987 at Queen’s University and Respirology in 1987 at Western. He completed a three year Basic Research Fellowship under the supervision of Dr. Alan Jobe at Harbour-UCLA Medical Center from 1988 to 1991 before becoming a faculty member at Western.

Dr. Lewis is a Clinician Scientist and Professor of Medicine with a cross appointment in Physiology and Pharmacology at Schulich Medicine & Dentistry. He is a practising clinician seeing general respirology cases with an interest in asthma in athletes. He previously served as a Director of the Asthma Centre at St. Joseph’s Health Care London. His other clinical responsibilities include teaching medical students, residents and fellows.

Dr. Lewis is a Principal Investigator at the Lawson Health Research Institute. He supervises and mentors research students and trainees, including undergraduates, master’s, PhD and post‐doctoral fellows. In addition, he has didactic and small-group teaching responsibilities for undergraduate students in the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, and lectures to nursing and physiotherapy students.

He previously held an appointment as Assistant Dean, Clinical Research at Schulich Medicine & Dentistry from 2004 to 2010. In the role, he was the Chair of the MD/PhD Program and developed the Resident Research Career Development Program supporting the training of clinician scientists.

Dr. Lewis is a world renowned researcher. He has obtained funding from the CIHR for the past 24 years, and has served on the CIHR Respiration Grants Review Committee as a reviewer, Scientific Officer and Chair. He has also been a member of the Ontario Thoracic Society Research Advisory Committee. He has been a guest lecturer in France, Spain, Belgium, China, Japan, Australia, Switzerland, the Netherlands and the United States.

His research interests have been in the area of surfactant and its role in acute lung injury and multi‐organ failure. Recently Dr. Lewis’ research focus has been on combining surfactant with anti-microbial peptides in order to optimize treatment of lung infections. This change in research focus has coincided with his appointment as Director of the Adult Cystic Fibrosis Program in London.

Please join me in congratulating Dr. Lewis on his appointment.

Dr. Michael J. Strong,
Dean Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry