International Scientific Advisory Group (ISAG) 2025
2025 meeting documents
The International Scientific Advisory Group is a key and crucial entity within the O’Brien Institute for Public Health community. The ISAG is made up of international leaders in their respective fields – their main contribution to the Institute being a periodic visit, based on which they formulate assessments and present suggestions on how best to position the Institute as a leader in public health in Alberta and beyond. By providing members of the ISAG with an intimate look at the work being done at the Institute, and the impact its initiatives have generated, these experts are able to lend an external perspective, and international context, to the scientific endeavours of the Institute.
Research Impact Assessment
This year’s impressive group of visitors includes Evelyne de Leeuw, John Frank, and Murray Ross.
Professor, School of Public Health, Univerisity of Montreal
Evelyne de Leeuw
Dr. Evelyne de Leeuw is a professor of public health at the School of Public Health at the University of Montreal (ESPUM) where she holds a ‘Canada Excellence Research Chair’ in One Urban Health. Her background is in public health and health promotion, cities, and health political science. She has been part of the European Healthy Cities movement since its launch in 1986. She has been editor for the journal Health Promotion International until 2023 and is an editor of the Oxford Research Encyclopedia in Global Public Health. Her current innovation efforts aim at the integration of One Health and Healthy Cities. Evelyne also currently acts as Vice-President of Scientific Affairs of the International Union of Health Promotion and Education, IUHPE. She was a member of the O’Brien Institute’s 2019 ISAG visit.
Professorial Fellow, University of Edinburgh
John Frank
Professor John Frank is a physician-epidemiologist with 48 years of primary care/ public health practice, research, teaching and consulting, in four countries. He has led three new start-up non-profit Institutes/Centres for applied public health research, in Canada and Scotland, since 1991. His main area of expertise is health inequalities by socio-economic status, with a special focus on the prevention of chronic disease. He successfully led three public health research start-ups, mandated to influence policy and practice, requiring leadership of multi-disciplinary teams, with a total funding value of over £50 million. He was the Scientific Director, Canadian Institutes of Health Research (Institute of Population and Public Health), Toronto/Ottawa (2000-2008).
Former Vice President & Director, Kaiser Permanente
Murray Ross
Dr. Murray Ross served as Vice President with Kaiser Permanente in Oakland, California, where he led the Kaiser Permanente Institute for Health Policy, retiring in 2023. He continues to serve as Senior Lecturer at the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine. Dr. Ross chairs the boards of the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review and the Network for Excellence in Health Innovation, and served on the board of the Canadian Foundation for Healthcare Improvement. An economist by training, Dr. Ross speaks frequently to domestic and international audiences on a range of health care and policy topics. Before joining Kaiser Permanente in 2002, he was an advisor to the U.S. Congress, first with the Congressional Budget Office and later as executive director of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission.