Dr. Chakraborty is a physician certified by the Royal College in Medical Biochemistry and Pediatrics, with a subspecialty in Biochemical Genetics. He joined CHEO in 2003 as a clinician seeing patients with inborn errors of metabolism. In 2006, he led the transition of Ontario’s newborn screening program to Ottawa leading to the establishment of Newborn Screening Ontario (NSO) at CHEO. In 2008, he was instrumental in the founding of the Better Outcomes Registry and Network (BORN Ontario) at CHEO as a prescribed registry in Ontario, and was the Medical Director of BORN until 2017.
At NSO, the research program focuses on developing novel laboratory methods and clinical biomarkers, most recently using metabolomics and genomics, studying policy, and clinical research in newborn screening.
In addition to leading the research program within NSO, Dr. Chakraborty is a Principal Investigator for the Canadian Inherited Metabolic Disease Research Network (CIMDRN), which has received over $2M in CIHR funding since its inception to support rare disease research, in order to improve patient care experiences and outcomes in this population.
Dr. Chakraborty is a Co-Principal Investigator with Dr. Kumanan Wilson and Dr. Steven Hawken at The Ottawa Hospital to assess the feasibility of using newborn heel prick blood samples to estimate gestational age infants in low-resource settings. Families are also able to receive newborn screening for select diseases, similar to what is offered to babies here in Ontario. Overall, this project has received $2.5 million USD from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Related News
Research Projects
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Assessing the quality and value of metabolic chart data for capturing core outcomes for pediatric medium-chain acyl-CoA dehydrogenase (MCAD) deficiency
13/01/2024
To improve care and long-term outcomes for children with MCAD deficiency, rigorous approaches to evaluation of treatments are needed, informed by reliable, sustainable, and longitudinal measurement of clinically meaningful and patient-centred outcomes [12, 13]. A core outcome set (COS) is a small group of priority outcomes agreed upon by stakeholders interested in a specific health condition with the goal of encouraging the standardized measurement and reporting of endpoints measured during clinical trials for that condition [14, 15]. The development and implementation of COSs can support the synthesis of evidence and the comparison of findings across clinical trials where appropriate. These outcomes can also be collected as part of a high-quality disease registry to establish robust observational data over time and to facilitate registry-based randomized trials, where a trial is implemented in a registry platform that incorporates rigorous outcome measurement [16]. There is a particular need for multi-centre and international collaboration in rare disease settings, given the small number of patients in any single centre. A COS can facilitate such collaboration in rare disease research as part of the harmonization of data on long-term outcomes and treatment effectiveness in small populations, thereby increasing the robustness of data pooling and thus improving the quality of evidence.
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Data Resource Profile: Better Outcomes Registry & Network (BORN) Ontario
01/11/2021
The Better Outcomes Registry & Network (BORN) Ontario collects pregnancy, birth and newborn information and outcomes data for nearly all births in Ontario, Canada. With nearly complete capture of the approximate 140 000 births each year in Ontario—∼40% of births in Canada—BORN Ontario is the largest perinatal registry in the country.
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Core Outcome Sets for Medium-Chain Acyl-CoA Dehydrogenase Deficiency and Phenylketonuria
14/08/2021
Adoption in future studies will help to ensure best use of limited research resources to ultimately improve care for children with these rare diseases.
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Newborn Screening for Spinal Muscular Atrophy: Ontario Testing and Follow-up Recommendations
16/10/2020
The goal is to provide timely access to those SMA infants in need of therapy to optimize motor function and prolong survival.
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Carnitine uptake defect due to a 5′UTR mutation in a pedigree with false positives and false negatives on Newborn screening
10/12/2019
Western blotting revealed a 120 kDa protein band, as well as a weaker 240 kDa band in the proband, the significance of which is unknown at this time.