Kirk Schultz MD, PhD

Dr. Kirk Schultz is a Professor at the University of British Columbia, BC Children’s Hospital, and the Child and Family research Institute (CFRI) who has published over 220 peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals. He is a Pediatric Hematologist/Oncologist focused on new therapies and rejection in Blood and Marrow Transplantation (BMT) and immune therapy of blood cancers. Dr. Schultz was the recipient of the CIHR/Wyeth Clinical Research Chair in Transplantation and is past chair of the Pediatric BMT Consortium, the largest children’s BMT clinical trials group in the world. He was recently appointed a fellowship in the Canadian Academy of health Sciences and is the current president of Cell Therapy Transplantation Canada (CTTC).

Dr. Schultz’s lab is attempting to harness the immune system to cure child leukemia and to use blood-derived stem cells to cure other life-threatening childhood diseases. Currently, blood and marrow transplantation (BMT) is the only successful form of immune therapy for childhood leukemia. Dr. Schultz’s research group focuses on harnessing the immune forces unleashed by BMT to improve immune therapy for childhood leukemia. By increasing their understanding of these important immune forces, they hope to also improve the ability to provide safe tissue transplants when needed. Lastly, the group is focused on developing approaches to extend the ability to use blood-derived stem cells to regenerate damaged tissues, correct the immune system, and save children and adolescents from life threatening childhood diseases.