Who We Are

Dr. Gina Agarwal describes herself as a Primary Care Epidemiologist and she is the Director of the Vulnerable individuals in Primary Care (VIP) Research Lab that focuses on improving health systems for vulnerable populations, ensuring people in need receive appropriate care at the right time and in the right place. Her work has driven health system change in Ontario. It has been published in influential journals including the Canadian Medical Association Journal and been featured by national media, including the CBC. She holds multiple major grants from the Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR) and Hamilton Health Sciences for her research on novel health risk-assessment programs for seniors in vulnerable areas and seniors’ buildings. Her work with community paramedicine has been recognized as the foundation for the standardized ‘wellness clinic’ provision offered by paramedics across many municipalities.

Gina is the Principal Investigator of the McMaster Community Paramedicine Research Team. The Community Paramedicine at Clinic (CP@clinic) program was inspired by her PhD work in which she pioneered community risk assessment for diabetes and links to her involvement with other CHAP-like research programs in the South Asian Community (C-ChAMP). She is also the lead of the CHAP-Philippines research program, and has an avid interest in Global Health Research. She co-leads the UK-Canada Emergency calls Data analysis and GEospatial mapping (EDGE) Consortium, working with a team at the University of Lincoln on mapping healthcare usage and SES. She has also worked extensively in social housing, trying to improve the health of this vulnerable population while also studying healthcare usage patterns. Gina is also the recipient of a McMaster University Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact faculty award for Justice, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Indigenous reconciliation (JEDI-IR), recognizing the impact of her work in vulnerable populations.

An academic general practitioner who trained and worked in England since the early 90’s, Gina joined the McMaster Department of Family Medicine in 2000. She works as a family physician with a busy family practice at the McMaster Family Practice (MFP) where she is deeply involved in training family medicine residents.

Her research experience started in the UK as a fellow with the Imperial College School of Medicine where she developed and worked on the National Survey of Diabetes Care for the British Diabetes Association. Since moving to Canada, she has been the recipient of many research grants and held research fellowships with CIHR and Diabetes Canada. Her PhD in Epidemiology was awarded the Faculty of Health Sciences Graduate Program Outstanding Thesis Award by McMaster University. She is one of a few active practicing family physicians who also holds a PhD.

She worked extensively with the Public Health Agency of Canada around the development and validation of the CANRISK diabetes scoring tool. She received an Award of Excellence from the College of Family Physicians of Canada in 2016 and CIHR selected her as one of Canada’s 150 Researchers. Gina was presented the prestigious Mid-Career Researcher Award from the North American Primary Care Research Group (NAPCRG) in November 2018.

Gina regularly supervises undergraduate, masters and doctoral students. Her students have been successful in obtaining research grants and have won McMaster University Health Sciences Quality Assurance Awards and Ontario College of Family Physicians Resident Research Prizes. In 2017, she was recognized for her excellence in student supervision by the McMaster University Department of Health Research Methodology, Evidence and Impact.