Dr. Samy Suissa stands as a preeminent figure in clinical epidemiology and pharmacoepidemiology, holding the distinguished position of James McGill Professor across the Departments of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Medicine at McGill University. He currently serves as Director of the Centre for Clinical Epidemiology at the Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research, where he has established himself as a transformative leader in drug safety research. As the founding head of the Canadian Network for Observational Drug Effect Studies (CNODES), he has built one of North America's most influential pharmacoepidemiology research consortia, bringing together expertise from multiple institutions to address critical questions in medication safety. His earlier leadership as founding Director of the Quebec Research Network on Medication Use laid important groundwork for his current national initiatives in medication safety research.
Dr. Suissa's groundbreaking research has fundamentally shaped our understanding of medication risks and benefits in real world settings, with his studies on inhaled corticosteroids for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease becoming seminal works that demonstrated these medications prevent disease progression. His methodological innovations in observational drug studies have provided the scientific community with rigorous frameworks for evaluating medication safety that have been adopted by regulatory agencies worldwide. Through his leadership of CNODES, he has pioneered novel approaches to rapid drug safety signal detection using linked health databases across Canada, creating a model now emulated internationally. His extensive body of work, reflected in numerous high impact publications, has established new standards for evidence generation in pharmacoepidemiology and significantly influenced clinical practice guidelines for medication use.
Beyond his research contributions, Dr. Suissa has profoundly shaped the global pharmacoepidemiology community through his service on editorial boards of leading journals including Diabetes Care, Gut, and Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety. He has provided critical guidance to international drug safety initiatives as a member of the External Advisory Board of PROTECT, the European Innovative Medicines Initiative drug safety consortium. His exceptional contributions have been recognized through prestigious honors including election as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, alongside the distinguished FC Donders Professor Award from Universiteit Utrecht. Currently directing major research programs through CNODES and the McGill Pharmacoepidemiology Research Unit, Dr. Suissa continues to advance methodologies that ensure medications provide maximum benefit with minimal risk for patients worldwide.
