Biography
Dr. Chris Nguan is a kidney transplant urologist and the surgical director of renal transplantation at Vancouver General Hospital. He serves on the federally appointed Canadian Blood Services panel of the Kidney Transplant Advisory Committee and is chair of the National Kidney Surgical Services Subcommittee, impacting organ transplant services across Canada. He is also associate professor at the the Department of Urologic Sciences at the University of British Columbia (UBC). His main areas of research are twofold: research in applied sciences with focus on advanced technologies for medicine and surgery including computer vision, AR/VR, diagnostic imaging and machine learning; as well as basic and translational science related to cell, tissue and organ preservation, diagnostics, organ modification and transplant outcomes.
Dr. Nguan has authored over 100 peer reviewed publications and is named on six novel patents. He previously held the chief medical officer (CMO) position with UBC spinoff companies Sonic Incytes and AVIVO Biotechnology. He co-founded the Collective Open Source Medical Innovations for COVID-19 (COSMIC), where he also served and president and director. He has served in a regulatory capacity with the BC College of Physicians and Surgeons as an elected member of the Board of Directors, and continues to serve as the longtime program director of the UBC Urology Postgraduate Training Program with active research in assessment methods and curriculum development. Dr. Nguan is an advocate for the elimination of systemic racism in medicine, and his interest in diversity, equity and inclusion principles has led to some of the most widely cited literature in medical education. He is a proponent for planetary health and conducts seminal studies on environmentally impactful therapies such as dialysis and the benefits of kidney transplantation.
