Dr. Brenda Gallie is a world-renowned ophthalmologist who discovered the genetic mutations that cause retinoblastoma. Retinoblastoma is a rare eye cancer diagnosed predominately in children under the age of 2. Early in her career, Dr. Gaillie was a recipient of a Banting Research Foundation grant, which helped launch her distinguished research career exploring and expanding healthcare provided to retinoblastoma patients.
Dr. Gallie completed medical school at Queen’s University, and subsequently conducted her residency training in the Department of Ophthalmology and Vision Science at the University of Toronto. She took a research fellowship in immunology and cancer at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, focusing on retinoblastoma, before returning to the University of Toronto as an Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology.
Gallie was awarded the Banting Research Foundation grant to study the mutations that cause retinoblastoma, as well as possible treatments for the disease. The Banting Research Foundation supports early-career health and biomedical researchers with funding to pursue bold research ideas with high impact. With this support to start her independent research, she discovered the different mutations of the retinoblastoma 1 (RB1) gene that led to the progression of retinoblastoma, as well as many other genes involved in lung and ovarian cancers. Her research team also discovered retinoma, a tissue growth in the eye that can increase the risk for retinoblastoma,. Now a Professor of Medical Biophysics, Molecular Genetics and Ophthalmology, Dr. Gallie also serves as the program head of the Retinoblastoma Program at SickKids Hospital in Toronto. In this role, she works to ensure the integration of research and patient care for treating retinoblastoma in children.
As an ophthalmologist, Dr. Gallie takes great care in integrating her research and clinical practice, ensuring that her young patients receive tailored treatment. Dr. Gallie and her research team developed cost-effective genetic tests for mutations to better understand a child’s individual case of retinoblastoma, and curate the best treatment for it. To accomplish this, she founded Retinoblastoma Solutions (now Impact Genetics) to produce genetic tests for multiple rare diseases to help families worldwide. Among her most prominent patients were triplets whom she treated with another leader in the field. The triplets each had one eye with retinoblastoma consisting of multiple tumors. Based on her research, she was able to provide an early diagnosis and removed all of the tumours in a single surgery. Her care for these triplets left the parents with full confidence and hope that their children would lead healthy and fulfilling lives.
Dr. Gallie’s dedication to improving the patient experience resulted in her role leading the Canadian Retinoblastoma Strategy to create clinical care guidelines and to support quality care. Additionally, as the leader of the Health and Informatics Research Team at the Techna Institute in Toronto, she created DEPICT HEALTH. This is a database to help create a line of communication for researchers, patients and healthcare teams to support quality care with the goal to make retinoblastoma a ‘Zero Death’ cancer. While Dr. Gallie’s efforts have a wide reach locally, only a small percentage of children with retinoblastoma have benefited from her research. To this extent, she created a global network to develop clinical trials, accessible genetic testing and point-of-care services in Eastern Africa, India and China.
Having the support of the Banting Research Foundation early in her career created the opportunities for Dr. Gallie to make groundbreaking discoveries in retinoblastoma. For her excellence in research, patient care and pioneering deliverance of personalized care across the world, she was appointed to the Order of Canada in 2014.
— Written by Eliza Ali