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SickKids

Valerie Waters

Title: Staff Physician, Division of Infectious Diseases
Designations: MD, M.Sc. 
Phone: 416-813-7654 ext. 306451
Email: valerie.waters@sickkids.ca
U of T Positions: Professor, Department of Paediatrics
Chair Positions: Vice-Chair, Healthcare Advisory Council, Cystic Fibrosis Canada

Research Positions

Senior Associate Scientist
Translational Medicine

Biography

Dr. Valerie Waters is a Professor of Paediatrics at the University of Toronto and has been a full-time staff physician in the Division of Infectious Diseases at SickKids since 2005. She is also a Senior Associate Scientist in Translational Medicine at SickKids Research Institute.

Dr. Waters received her MD from McGill University, Montreal, Canada and did her paediatric residency at SickKids. She then completed a paediatric infectious diseases fellowship at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Centre and obtained her Masters in Biostatistics at Columbia University, New York.

Research

Waters' research program is focused on the investigation of the epidemiology and treatment of multi-drug resistant bacterial pathogens causing lung infections in patients with cystic fibrosis (CF). She is particularly interested in the way these organisms grow as communities of bacteria known as biofilms, which are associated with increased antimicrobial resistance. The Waters Lab has developed novel biofilms models to test the efficacy of compounds against Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilms, in the context of host factors and other microbes. They are currently studying the interaction between Staphylococcus aureus and P. aeruginosa grown within biofilms in the context of failure of early eradication treatment of P. aeruginosa in children with CF. In addition, the team also investigate the effects of antibiotic treatment of pulmonary exacerbations in CF and are conducting a clinical trial of oral prednisone as an adjuvant therapy in CF patients with pulmonary exacerbations.

Education and experience

  • 2003–2005: M.Sc. Biostatistics, Columbia University School of Public Health
  • 1993–1998: MD, McGill University
  • 1991–1993: B.Sc., Marianopolis College, Diploma of Collegial Studies in Health Sciences 

Achievements

  • 2007: Nominee-Subspecialty Education Award, Hospital for Sick Children
  • 2005: POR Scholar, Joseph L. Mailman School of Public Health, Academic Scholarship, Columbia University
  • 1999: Frederick Fitzgerald Tisdall Award for Research
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