Research team: 

Derek Choi (Co-PI) 

Derek Choi is the co-lead for the MedMarket Mavericks project. He is currently working at Johnson and Johnson Innovative Medicines within the Market Access team, and completing his Master’s of Health Science in Translational Research at the University of Toronto. Derek brings a wealth of experience from a multitude of projects.  Coming from a scientific background, Derek completed his Honours Bachelor’s of Science in Biotechnology and Chemistry at the University of Toronto Mississauga. During his undergraduate, he completed a research term at the Westwood Lab, and an internship at MaRS Discovery District. Derek is interested and open to chatting about healthcare innovation, Canadian drug pathways, the economics of healthcare, and Market Access.  

 Zoya Aziz Bhatti (Co-PI) 

Zoya is the co-lead for the MedMarket Mavericks project. She is currently immersed in the healthcare space and has supported the coordination of provincial homecare coordination at Home and Community Care Support Services for over three years. Zoya also has teaching interests and currently acts as a teaching assistant at the Translational Research Program where she supports efforts that teach students how to critically reflect on problems, identify problems and needs, and innovate to adopt creative solutions that tackle unmet needs. Zoya provides a diverse set of experiences and is well versed in project management, active listening, crisis de-escalation and patient support and navigation. Zoya comes from a medical sciences background, she completed an Honours Bachelor’s of Medical Sciences, with a specialization in interdisciplinary Medical Sciences. During her undergraduate degree, Zoya supported the Appleton Research lab with ongoing research looking to characterize a non-invasive model of post-traumatic osteoarthritis and completed an internship at Sanofi Pasteur where she supported with research and development activities as well as sample testing. Zoya is eager to drive health innovation and impact, she is interested in start-up commercialization, healthcare strategy and procurement.  

Project advisory board: 

Juli Smyth 

Juli Smyth is a senior strategic sourcing specialist at UHN, with over a decade of experience working in procurement of various health solutions. Juli has led both corporate and regional projects and is an expert in the application of the Broader Public Sector Procurement (BPSP) Directives. While at UHN Juli has led several innovative procurements including Integrated Project Delivery and Competitive Dialogue. For this project, Juli will provide her perspective and share experiences as to the nuances of healthcare procurement.    

Bibaswan Ghoshal 

Bibaswan Ghoshal is the senior director of technology adoption and leads the early adopter’s health network at Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization. Through the EAHN, Bibaswan collaborates with the public healthcare system and SEs to streamline the process for startup procurement. Bibaswan’s work assists Canadian health science innovations to get adopted by the domestic health systems.   

Marissa Bird 

Dr. Marissa Bird is a Registered Nurse and Scientist in the Learning Health System Program at the Institute for Better Health, Trillium Health Partners with an assistant professor appointment at the University of Toronto. Dr. Bird is a recognized scholar in health innovation, learning health systems, co-design, and evaluation. Her work program focuses on creating sustainable innovation in healthcare environments by optimizing innovations for sustainability within Learning Health Systems and supporting the health system to transform toward sustainability.