(Vancouver) – Dr. Julio Montaner has accepted the position of Director, BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS and Physician Program Director for HIV/AIDS at St. Paul’s Hospital, part of Providence Health Care.
Dr. Montaner has been with St. Paul’s Hospital since 1981 and has been Director of Clinical Activities at the BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS since its establishment over a decade ago. He is Professor of Medicine and Chair of AIDS Research at the University of British Columbia and a founding Co-Director of the Canadian HIV Trials Network.
“Dr. Montaner is a skilled and knowledgeable clinician and one of Canada’s top clinical researchers in the HIV/AIDS field. We are delighted to have him in this role and look forward to his continuing contributions and leadership,” said Carl Roy, President and Chief Executive Officer of Providence Health Care.
In 1988, Dr Montaner became a faculty member with UBC as the Director of AIDS Research and the Infectious Diseases Clinic at St. Paul’s. In 1996, he successfully competed for the endowed Chair in AIDS at St. Paul’s and UBC, the first such initiative in Canada. In 1997, he was appointed Professor of Medicine at UBC.
Among his many outstanding achievements, Dr. Montaner was awarded the 1995 Pasteur Prize (Canada) for his contribution to clinical research in the field of HIV/AIDS. He was given a $1-million award in Research Excellence by Boehringer-Ingelheim in 2001, which he donated to UBC for the creation of an endowment in Health Outcomes HIV Research based at St Paul’s. In 2003, together with his colleagues at the BC Centre, he received a $1.7 million award from GlaxoSmithKline that was donated to UBC for the creation of an endowment in Research on HIV Virology based at St. Paul’s. He also helped establish an endowment at UBC for a Chair in Addictions based at St. Paul’s.
Founded in 1992 by St. Paul’s Hospital and the provincial Ministry of Health, the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS is a key provincial resource seeking to improve the health of people with HIV through the development, ongoing monitoring and dissemination of comprehensive investigative and treatment programs for HIV and related diseases.
Providence Health Care is Canada’s largest faith-based health care organization and operates six health-care facilities in Vancouver.