Speakers
Keynote Speaker: Dr. Natasha Johnson
Dr. Natasha Johnson (MD, FAAP, FRCPC) is the Associate Chair,
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, and an Associate Professor with
the Department of Pediatrics at McMaster University and McMaster
Children’s Hospital in Ontario. She is also the Co-Chair,
Diversity and Inclusion, for the Undergraduate Medical Education
Program at McMaster University. A passionate advocate for
children, youth, and families affected by racism and other types
of oppression, she works with pediatric leadership and community
partners to guide a strategic vision to promote anti-oppression
and anti-racism. She is the 2018 recipient of the Pat Mandy
Inclusion Award for outstanding contributions towards the
inclusion and support of gender-diverse youth, and a 2023
recipient of the YWCA Women of Distinction Award for her
work supporting equity-deserving populations and marginalized
youth, and her impact on the Hamilton community. In 2016, she
established a clinical service providing gender affirming care to
trans and gender diverse youth and their families – the first of
its kind at McMaster Children’s Hospital, which in 2022 received
generous donor funding and expansion support. As a founding
member of the Anti-Racism Coalition in the Department of
Pediatrics at McMaster, she continues to lead transformative
change in healthcare, with a focus on marginalized youth, those
who have been historically oppressed, and equity-deserving
populations. She recently completed the University of British
Columbia Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Certificate Program in
early 2023.
Natasha’s parents immigrated to Canada from Jamaica. She was born and raised in Montreal where she did her medical training and where her parents still live. She is a single mother to two teen boys.
Affiliations
• McMaster University and McMaster Children’s Hospital
Panel Speakers
Dr. Modupe Tunde-Byass
Dr.
Modupe Tunde-Byass is a Fellow of the Royal College of
Obstetricians and Gynecologists of the UK and The Royal College
of Surgeons of Canada. Dr. Tunde-Byass is the President of the
Black Physicians of Canada (BPC). A national, not-for-profit
organization established in July 2020 after the death of Mr.
George Floyd. Dr. Tunde-Byass is involved in key quality
initiatives like increasing access to Vaginal Birth After
Cesarean section and improving the care of women undergoing Early
pregnancy complications and losses. She has presented some of her
research at international conferences and has publications in
peer review journals.
As the President of the Black Physicians of Canada, Dr.
Tunde-Byass collaborates with National organizations like the
Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, Canadian
Medical Protection Association, Canadian Medical Association,
Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (to mention a few) in
reviewing internal practices and policies related to Equity,
Diversity, and Inclusivity; additionally, she is involved with
research around COVID -19 hesitancy and COVID-19 online
mis/disinformation in Black communities. She is a co-author
on healthcare management publication on IDEA as a leadership
competency.
Dr. Tunde-Byass is the co-founder of Women’s Health Education
Made Simple (WHEMS), an initiative that started in the pandemic
to promote health literacy through online educational
resources.
Dr. Lisa Richarson
Dr.
Lisa Richardson is a mixed blood Anishinaabe physician and
clinician-educator in the Temerty Faculty of Medicine at the
University of Toronto. She practices General Internal Medicine at
the University Health Network and is a Centre Researcher at the
Wilson Centre with a scholarly focus on the integration of
Indigenous and critical perspectives from the social sciences
into medical education. Dr. Richardson is the Associate
Dean, Inclusion and Diversity at Temerty Medicine and is the
Strategic Lead in Indigenous Health for Women’s College Hospital
where she founded the Centre for Wise Practices in Indigenous
Health. Dr. Richardson is a powerful advocate for Indigenous
health equity at both the local and the national level and her
contributions have been recognized through numerous local,
national, and international awards.
Dr. Arno Kumagai
Dr.
Arno Kumagai is Professor and Vice Chair for Education,
Department of Medicine at the University of Toronto. He also
holds the F.M. Hill Chair in Humanism Education at Women’s
College Hospital, University of Toronto, where he has a clinical
practice focused on working with individuals with type 1 diabetes
mellitus. Dr. Kumagai received his BA in Comparative
Literature from U.C. Berkeley, and his MD from UCLA. He
finished his Internal Medicine Residency, Endocrine Fellowship
and postdoctoral training in the UCLA system and was on faculty
at the University of Michigan Medical School from 1996 to 2016.
He joined the University of Toronto’s Department of
Medicine in 2016. Dr. Kumagai has an international
reputation in medical education scholarship with a focus on
health humanities, humanism, and teaching for social justice in
medicine. He is also Assistant Editor for the journal
Academic
Dr. Ryan Giroux
Dr.
Ryan Giroux is a General Pediatrician working at St. Michael’s
Hospital and the Inner City Health Associates in Toronto. He is
Métis from the Métis Nation of Alberta and mixed settler
heritage. He is an Indigenous Educator at the Royal College of
Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, where he focuses on
accreditation, and is the University of Toronto Temerty Faculty
of Medicine’s PGME Indigenous Health Lead. He grew up on Treaty 6
and Treaty 8 territory in rural Alberta prior to completing a
Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology in Edmonton, and completed
medical school and his Pediatrics residency at the University of
Toronto & the Hospital for Sick Children. He is Co-Chair of
the Canadian Pediatric Society’s First Nation, Inuit, and Metis
Health Committee since 2017, where he has lead advocacy,
education, and research related to Indigenous child health. His
interests include Indigenous child health, refugee and newcomer
health, LGBTQ2S+ health, and medical education.