Lisa McCarthy is a scientist who studies the people, processes, and resources needed to develop, implement, evaluate, and sustain care models, built on evidence-base practices, that achieve better health for our community. She is also a pharmacist with more than 20 years of practice experience across many care settings – including hospitals and ambulatory settings (including family health teams, community pharmacies, and other clinics). Her research is grounded in this clinical experience.
She is an Associate Professor with UofT’s Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy and Department of Family and Community Medicine. She is also a Learning Health System Fellow at Trillium Health Partners and holds adjunct roles with Bruyère Research Institute, Women’s College Hospital, and the University of Waterloo.
McCarthy’s research enhances current knowledge about the risk factors of medication-related harm and identifies a number of key strategies to optimize the way medications are managed. By improving the quality of health care delivery, McCarthy’s work will improve patient and planetary health, and reduce health system costs associated with inappropriate prescribing.
She co-leads deprescribing.org, which creates evidence-based clinical practice guidelines and tools to support clinicians and the public to reduce doses or stop medications safely. Her research and clinical guidelines have had global impact on deprescribing practices. In Canada, her work has led to policy changes for deprescribing certain medications and has informed educational standards that guide future pharmacists to become leaders in medication management.