Senior Scientist, Inflammation and Chronic Disease
Ottawa Hospital Research Institute

Professor, Faculty of Medicine, School of Epimediology, Public Health and Preventive Medicine
University of Ottawa

Staff Respirologist, Division of Respirology & Infections Disease; Department of Medicine
The Ottawa Hospital

A leader in TB research, Dr. Gonzalo Alvarez is a respirologist committed to developing better tools and strategies to improve TB prevention and care for Indigenous communities and newcomers to Canada.

For more than 15 years, Dr. Alvarez has led the Taima TB research program dedicated to helping Inuit stop the spread of TB in their communities. His team develops community-driven screening, diagnostic, and education tools designed for the unique needs of remote regions. Working closely with Indigenous rights holders, the group has completed over ten studies in Nunavut, contributing to lasting improvements in TB care and prevention.

Dr. Alvarez currently leads two major multi-disciplinary projects funded by the CIHR and by Inuit partners, the Taima TB Wastewater Study and the Taima TB Household Risk Prediction Study, aimed at making community-wide TB screening more efficient, effective, and less burdensome for both health systems and community members. He is also working on several modelling and epidemiological studies examining the acceptability and cost effectiveness of different TB prevention strategies.

He is also an investigator for the McGill SSTaRLeT study, which is testing shorter, safer treatments for latent TB infection, with the Ottawa TB Clinic serving as one of the study sites.

Dr. Gonzalo Alvarez is the Head of the Division of Respirology at The Ottawa Hospital, a Professor of Medicine at the University of Ottawa, and a Scientist at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute. He joined the Division of Respirology in 2006, following two years as a clinical scholar during which he completed a Master of Public Health at Harvard University. He also holds a Tier 1 Clinical Research Chair through the University of Ottawa and The Ottawa Hospital’s Department of Medicine that is focused on working with Inuit partners toward tuberculosis elimination.

Dr. Alvarez has published more than 75 peer-reviewed papers and secured over $6 million in peer-reviewed funding as principal or co-principal investigator, including seven CIHR grants. His work has attracted national attention, with features on CBC Television and Radio, as well as in local, provincial, and national media.

Beyond his clinical work in Ottawa, Dr. Alvarez has long served as the respirology and tuberculosis consultant for the Department of Health in Nunavut. Since 2007, he has provided pulmonary care for Nunavummiut through the Qikiqtani General Hospital and through his Ottawa-based clinics.

Dr. Alvarez began his TB research career in South Africa and has also worked in Malawi. In 2011, together with Inuit partners, he co-founded the Taima TB (“stop TB” in Inuktitut) research group—an ongoing collaboration between Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. (NTI), the Government of Nunavut, and the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute/University of Ottawa. Since its inception, Taima TB has led several groundbreaking implementation studies, including initiatives on community awareness, preventive TB treatment (3HP), sputum induction, rapid TB testing (Xpert), and mapping transmission patterns. The team is currently leading a CIHR-funded study exploring the use of wastewater surveillance to support TB control in northern communities.

• Opportunities for tuberculosis elimination in the Canadian Arctic: cost-effectiveness of community-wide screening in a remote Arctic community. Zwerling A, Veerasingam E, Snyder E, Schertzer A, Travers K, Pim C, Pease C, Finn S, McElroy L, Allen J, Patterson M, Alvarez GG. Lancet Reg Health Am. 2024 Oct 30;40:100916.
  
  
• Effect of implementation of a 12-dose once-weekly treatment (3HP) in addition to standard regimens to prevent TB on completion rates: Interrupted time series design. Alvarez GG, Sullivan K, Pease C, Van Dyk D, Mallick R, Taljaard M, Grimshaw JM, Amaratunga K, Allen C, Brethour K, Mulpuru S, Pakhale S, Aaron SD, Cameron DW, Alsdurf H, Hui C, Zwerling AA. Int J Infect Dis. 2022 Apr;117:222-229.
  
  
• Molecular epidemiology of Mycobacterium tuberculosis to describe the transmission dynamics among Inuit residing in Iqaluit Nunavut using whole genome sequencing, Alvarez GG, Zwerling AA, Duncan C, Pease C, Van Dyk D, Behr MA, Lee RS, Mulpuru S, Pakhale S, Cameron DW, Aaron SD, Patterson M, Allen J, Sullivan K, Jolly A, Sharma MK, Jamieson FB. Clinical Infectious Diseases. April 2020

• The implementation of rifapentine and isoniazid (3HP) for the treatment of latent TB infection in two remote Arctic communities with a predominantly Inuit population, the Taima TB 3HP study, Alvarez GG, Van Dyk D, Mallick R, Lesperance S, Demaio P, Finn S, Edmunds-Potvin S, Patterson M, Pease C, Amaratunga K, Hui C, Cameron DW, Mulpuru S, Aaron SD, Momoli F, Zwerling A. International Journal of Circumpolar Health. April 2020

• Social determinants of health among residential areas with a high tuberculosis incidence in a remote Inuit community, Kilabuk E, Momoli F, Mallick R, Van Dyk D, Pease C, Zwerling A, Edmunds-Potvin S, Alvarez GG. Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health.  Senior author, student first author. January 2019. 
  
  
• The Feasibility, Accuracy, and Impact of Xpert MTB/RIF Testing in a Remote Aboriginal Community in Canada. Alvarez GG, Dyk DDV, Desjardins M, Yasseen AS 3rd, Aaron SD, Cameron DW, Obed N, Baikie M, Pakhale S, Denklnger CM, Sohn H, Pal M. Chest. 2015 Sep;148(3):767-773.
  
  
• The feasibility of the interferon gamma release assay and predictors of discordance with the tuberculin skin test for the diagnosis of latent tuberculosis infection in a remote Aboriginal community. Alvarez GG, Van Dyk DD, Davies N, Aaron SD, Cameron DW, Desjardins M, Mallick R, Obed N, Baikie M.PLoS One. 2014 Nov 11;9(11):e111986.
  
  
• Taima (stop) TB: the impact of a multifaceted TB awareness and door-to-door campaign in residential areas of high risk for TB in Iqaluit, Nunavut. Alvarez GG, VanDyk DD, Aaron SD, Cameron DW, Davies N, Stephen N, Mallick R, Momoli F, Moreau K, Obed N, Baikie M, Osborne G. PLoS One. 2014 Jul 17;9(7):e100975.

 

First Nations, Inuit and Métis Health; Health in disadvantaged peoples; Infectious disease; Lung disease; Population health; Tuberculosis

Clinical research; Epidemiology; Public health