Research Team

Faculty

Research Associates

Collaborators

Trainees

alumni

Faculty

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Mohsen Sadatsafavi, MD, PhD

Associate Professor and Associate Director – Research, Collaboration for Outcomes Research and Evaluation Health Outcomes | mohsen.sadatsafavi@ubc.ca

Dr. Mohsen Sadatsafavi is an Associate Professor at the University of British Columbia’s Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, with additional affiliations at the Centre for Heart Lung Innovation and the Legacy for Airway Health at UBC. He is the Principal Investigator of the Respiratory Evaluation Sciences Program (RESP).

His primary research interests lie in predictive analytics (clinical prediction modeling) and epidemiological modelling. His applied research focuses on chronic respiratory diseases, particularly asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Through his lab, Dr. Sadatsafavi employs a range of quantitative methods to project the outcomes of medical decisions—both at the individual level (in clinical decision-making) and at the broader population level (in health policy).

Learn more about him here.

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Kate Johnson, MSc, PhD

Assistant Professor (grant tenure-track) - Health Outcomes | kate.johnson@ubc.ca

Kate Johnson is an assistant professor with a joint appointment in the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences and the Division of Respiratory Medicine, Department of Medicine. She completed her PhD in the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship in health economics at the Comparative Health Outcomes, Policy, and Economics (CHOICE) Institute at the University of Washington.

Dr. Johnson is a health economics and outcomes researcher specializing in simulation modelling and comparative effectiveness evaluation with applications to respiratory disease. The overarching themes of her research are real-world evidence generation to understand disease trajectory and patterns of care, followed by simulation modelling to evaluate healthcare interventions for reducing the burden of disease on patients and the healthcare system. This work incorporates methods from epidemiology, health economics, and data science, applied to practical questions for improving the delivery of healthcare and the effectiveness of interventions in respiratory medicine. Her work addresses health policy questions in the areas of 1) medication access, 2) whole disease modelling of asthma and COPD with an emphasis on evaluating strategies for prevention and early intervention, 3) the impacts of air pollution on the burden of respiratory disease and the value of climate mitigation strategies, and 4) healthcare sustainability.

Learn more about her here.

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Collaborators

Don Sin MD, FRCP, MPH

Co-investigator | don.sin@hli.ubc.ca

Dr. Don Sin is the Canada Research Chair in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease and the head of Respiratory Medicine at Providence Health Care in Vancouver. According to Expertscape, he is the #1 medical expert in COPD across North America and 2nd in the world. He has published 300 peer-reviewed articles and has written numerous editorials and book chapters. He has published in the Lancet, JAMA, BMJ, and New England Journal of Medicine and Lancet. He serves on the scientific committee of the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) initiative (2009-present). His main research focus is to discover novel biomarkers to improve the care and diagnosis of patients with COPD, which currently is the 3rd leading cause of death worldwide. He serves as an editorial board member of several respiratory journals, including the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Chest, Journal of COPD Foundation and European Respiratory Journal. He is an associate editor of Thorax.

Learn more about him here.

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Larry D. Lynd, BSP, PhD

Co-investigator | larry.lynd@ubc.ca

Professor Larry Lynd is a pharmacist, epidemiologist, and health outcomes researcher. He completed his PhD in the Department of Health Care and Epidemiology at UBC and his post-doctoral fellowship in health economics at McMaster University. Currently, Dr. Lynd is Professor at the UBC Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences; at the Centre for Health Evaluation and Outcomes Sciences at the Providence Health Research Institute; Scholar at the Peter Wall Institute of Advanced Studies; and Associate of the UBC School of Population and Public Health.

Learn more about him here.

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Chris Carlsten, MD

Co-investigator | carlsten@mail.ubc.ca

Dr. Chris Carlsten, MD MPH is a Professor of Medicine, Canada Research Chair in Occupational and Environmental Lung Disease and holds the Astra-Zeneca Chair in Occupational and Environmental Lung Disease at the University of British Columbia. He is the Head of UBC Respiratory Medicine, Director of the Air Pollution Exposure Laboratory as well as the Legacy for Airway Health, and holds adjunct positions at the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies and the UBC School of Population and Public Health.

Learn more about him here.

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Emily Brigham, MD, MHS

Co-investigator | emily.brigham@ubc.ca

Dr. Brigham received her professional degrees at the Johns Hopkins Schools of Medicine and Public Health, completing her residency in Internal Medicine and fellowship in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at the Johns Hopkins Hospital where she was subsequently hired as faculty. She has been awarded highly competitive research awards through the National Institutes of Health, including a National Service Research Award, a Mentored Clinical Research Scholar Award, and most recently a Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award.

Learn more about her here.

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Dr. Kevin Duan, MD, MS

Co-investigator | kevin.duan@ubc.ca

Dr. Kevin Duan is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Respiratory Medicine at the University of British Columbia. He received his medical degree from the University of Michigan School of Medicine and a Master of Science in Health Services from the University of Washington School of Public Health. He completed internal medicine residency and a chief resident year at the University of California, San Francisco, followed by pulmonary and critical care fellowship and research training at the University of Washington. Dr. Duan is a health services researcher, studying health system organization, health policy, and health economics.

Learn more about him here.

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Stirling Bryan, PhD FCAHS

Co-investigator | stirling.bryan@ubc.ca

Dr. Stirling Bryan is health economist with extensive experience of engagement with the health policy and decision-making worlds. He began his career in the United Kingdom with appointments at St Thomas’ Hospital Medical School and then Brunel University, before moving to the University of Birmingham in 1997.

Learn more about him here.

Research Associates

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Alexander Lin

Research Manager | alexander.lin@ubc.ca

With a proven track record as a Research Administrator at UBC’s Collaboration for Outcomes Research and Evaluation (CORE), Alexander has extensive experience in project management and has provided coordination support for numerous research activities. He has collaborated with multi-disciplinary teams in the design, coordination, and execution of research projects related to epidemiology and health outcomes.

As the IMPACT Project Manager and RESP Research Coordinator, Alexander facilitates ethics and grant applications, including collecting relevant grant information, research budgeting, statistics, other relevant documents and much more. With a strong passion for improving healthcare outcomes for patients with asthma and COPD, Alexander is thrilled to be contributing to the mission of the RESP team.

Learn more about him here.

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Mehrshad Mokhtaran, MD, PhD

Information Systems Analyst | mmokht02@mail.ubc.ca

Mehrshad received his medical doctorate from Tehran University of Medical Science in 2002. He was the designer and technical manager of a team which implemented first Hospital Information System in Iran. He graduated in Master of Medical Information Technology from Amir Kabir University of Technology, in 2007, by focusing on Artificial Intelligence algorithms especially Genetic Algorithms. He was part of the team that designed and implemented a national Electronic Health Record in Iran. He was involved in many operational projects in the field of health informatics including Hospital Business Intelligence and Data Mining, Electronic Medical Record Systems, Health Insurance Integration Systems and Telemedicine, as a Software Architect and also by playing managerial roles. He received a PhD in Medical Informatics from Tehran University of Medical Science in 2017, with a focus on applying AI and ontology in designing Clinical Prediction Models. He has started a second PhD course in Electronic Health and Biomedical Informatic, University of Pavia, Italy.

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Amin Adibi, MSc

Statistical Research Scientist, PhD Student | amin.adibi@ubc.ca

Amin Adibi, M.Sc., is a research scientist and a Ph.D. student at the University of British Columbia. He is a co-founder of Peer Models Network, an initiative to make health economics and clinical prediction models more accessible, and a member of the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) Collaborator Network. He has previously authored high-impact publications on the validation and utility testing of clinical prediction models, prediction of acute COPD exacerbations, and the burden of uncontrolled asthma. Amin is currently researching issues related to fairness, risk of harm, human-AI interaction, and other challenges of implementing machine learning models in respiratory clinics.

Learn more about him here.

Trainees

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Jeenat Mehareen, MA

jeenatm@student.ubc.ca

Jeenat is an incoming PhD student in RESP at UBC. She has recently finished her MA in Economics from Simon Fraser University (SFU) with a SSHRC funded Canada Graduate Scholarship. She currently works as a Data Analyst at BC Cancer Research Centre under Cancer Control Research where she is exploring the trends in incidences and mortality of childhood and young adult cancer survivors residing in British Columbia. She has a wide variety of quantitative research, academic and administrative experience in roles ranging from research assistant to principal investigator for projects related to randomized control trials, health care financing strategies and mental health economics. Jeenat’s research interest lies in the field of health economics and economic evaluations to conduct advanced cross-disciplinary research and collaboration. She loves travelling and exploring new food places in her free time.

Learn more about her here.

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Ramin Rezaeianzadeh, MSc, BSc

raminrzn@student.ubc.ca

Ramin is a doctoral student in the Respiratory Evaluation Sciences Program (RESP) at UBC. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Genetics from Iran and completed a Master of Science degree in the Experimental Medicine Program at UBC. During his time in Iran, Ramin worked as a research assistant, contributing to a population-based cohort study focused on chronic outcomes in southwest Iran. This experience has led to multiple publications that enhanced understanding of this understudied population. At UBC, Ramin's master's training involved pharmacoepidemiologic research, where he investigated drug adverse events in large populations using administrative databases. His work included training in causal inference and analyzing the relationships between variables in causal models. In his role at RESP, Ramin will apply his previous and new learnings to a project aimed at enhancing the efficiency of the Canadian lung cancer screening program. This project focuses on improving the current screening program and evaluating its cost-effectiveness and budget impact with the ultimate aim of improving health outcomes of Canadians. In his free time, Ramin finds joy in taking long walks in Vancouver and exploring new coffee shops.

Learn more about him here.

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Kevin Yan, MSc, PharmD

kevin.yan@ubc.ca

Kevin is a licensed pharmacist and PhD candidate at the University of British Columbia, affiliated with the Legacy for Airway Health and the Respiratory Evaluation Sciences Program (RESP). He also completed his pharmacy degree at the University of British Columbia.

Kevin’s research focuses on health services research, particularly disease and economic modelling. He applies discrete event simulation modelling to evaluate healthcare interventions for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and to adapt and recalibrate these models for use across different healthcare systems. His work also integrates health equity considerations into economic evaluations through distributional cost-effectiveness analysis to support more equitable healthcare decision-making.

Learn more about him here.

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Yasith Samarasinghe, MPH, BHSc

samarasy@student.ubc.ca

Yasith is a doctoral student in RESP at UBC. He holds a Master of Public Health and a Bachelor of Health Sciences (Honours) from McMaster University. Yasith has a broad range of research experience across both industry and academic settings. He has managed industry-sponsored clinical trials and assisted in the development of numerous general surgery publications. During his Master’s degree, Yasith conducted an epidemiologic analysis of temporal trends in preterm birth rates across the United States, identifying key demographic and clinical disparities. At UBC, his PhD research focuses on developing predictive models for cardiovascular disease among patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), with the goal of improving risk stratification and informing clinical decision-making. Outside of research, Yasith enjoys biking, kayaking, whittling, and playing video games.

Learn more about him here.

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Kayly Choy, BPSc

kayly@student.ubc.ca

Kayly is a recent graduate of the Bachelor of Pharmaceutical Sciences at UBC and she joined the RESP lab as a research assistant in 2024. Her research interests include health economics and outcomes research, clinical epidemiology, and policy decision making. She plans to conduct interdisciplinary research with the goal of improving patient health outcomes and assessing the effectiveness of therapeutic and policy interventions in the community. She is also interested in using data visualization to communicate research more effectively. In her free time Kayly enjoys baking, painting her nails, and travelling.

Learn more about her here.

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Crystal Leung, BPSc

sycleung@student.ubc.ca

Crystal is an MSc student in the RESP lab and a CORE member since  2025. She holds a Bachelor of Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of British Columbia and previously worked as a clinical research coordinator on respiratory disease studies. Her research interests include health economics/outcomes research and decision modelling. Outside the lab, Crystal enjoys hiking, baking and discovering neighbourhood cafés.

Learn more about her here.