Speaker Bios

Corrie Sirota MSW, PSW is a Clinical Social Worker and Psychotherapist who specializes in Grief and Loss. Corrie is the author of Someone Died Now What – A Personal and Professional Perspective on Coping with Grief and Loss. She is a private practitioner, a Tedx speaker, a faculty lecturer in the McGill School of Social Work and the co-host of the weekly radio show “Life Unrehearsed” Corrie is married and is the mom of Ashley and Justine and loves to laugh.

Ray Truant completed his Bachelor’s degree at the University of Toronto and continued on to his graduate studies in the Department of Medical Genetics in the lab of Jack F. Greenblatt at the C.H. Best Institute.

For his graduate work, his studies focused on protein-protein interactions of the p53 tumor-suppressor protein and its mechanism of activation of transcription, in the context of cancer. After receiving his doctorate in 1996, Ray studied as a post-doctoral Research Associate at the Howard Hughes Medical Research Institute at Duke University, North Carolina,  in the department of Genetics with Dr. Bryan R. Cullen. While at the HHMI, his research centered on protein-protein interactions of HIV-1 proteins and into mechanisms of protein transport to and from the nucleus using biochemical and cell biological techniques. This toolbox of methods he developed was them applied to Huntington’s disease research upon starting his own lab in 1999.

In 1999, Ray was appointed Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences at McMaster University, where he started new projects on polyglutamine diseases, focusing on Huntington’s Disease. In 2001, Ray won the CIHR “New Scientist” award and his group is supported by ongoing operating grants from the CIHR and the Krembil Foundation, as well as the Huntington Society of Canada, The Huntington’s Disease Society of America and the Hereditary Disease Foundation. In 2012 he was awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal for public service and in 2014 the Michael Wright Community Leadership Award.

Dr. Truant is currently Full Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences and was Chair of the Scientific Advisory board, and Board Officer of the Huntington Society of Canada 2007-2021.

He is currently co-Director of the new McMaster Centre for Advanced Light Microscopy (CALM), and the lab is supported by 2020 grants from the CIHR Genetics Institute, NSERC Discovery Program, New Frontiers in Research program and the Krembil Foundation in Toronto, as well as equipment grants from the Canada Foundation for Innovation.

Angie Dale is a daughter/sister/mom/partner/scientist and writer. She is the author of the blog “Absolutely Messy and Absolutely Fabulous” where she shares her ups, downs, and adventures in life. Recently she has started sharing her thoughts on Huntington’s disease, survivor’s guilt, and her journey through the dark times of life and coping with depression. She was born into the Huntington’s community along with her dad and sister. She has been at risk, a caregiver, and has travelled the long road of loss so common to families that carry this gene. She is here today to talk about that experience and how it has affected her emotionally.

Based on her own experience of caring for family elders, Elaine Sanchez developed a passion for helping other caregivers cope with the emotional stress of caring for loved ones living with Huntington’s, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and other long-term, progressive, and degenerative diseases.

Before COVID, Elaine delivered keynotes and breakout sessions at healthcare and caregiving conferences throughout the U.S. After all of her conferences for 2020 were canceled due to the pandemic, she had a video production studio built in her home, and she transitioned to presenting keynotes and facilitating support group meetings online.

Elaine believes that caregiving is one of the most difficult and generous acts of love any of us will ever perform on behalf of another. She also believes that it is entirely too difficult to take seriously all of the time. When she shares her real-life stories about managing caregiver anger, guilt, depression, grief, as well as dementia-related challenging behaviors, people laugh more than they cry. They come away feeling validated, uplifted, and empowered to care for themselves as they continue to care for others.

Clare Gibbons received a Master of Science degree in Genetic Counseling from Sarah Lawrence College in 1996 and then joined the Genetics Program at North York General Hospital in Toronto where she currently works as the manager of Clinical Genetics.  Throughout her career, she has participated in the care of a wide variety of genetics patients and has been a member of the North York General Hospital Huntington Disease Multidisciplinary team for over 20 years.  Clare is currently a research coordinator for number of observational trials and clinical trials, including Enroll HD, SHIELD HD, and KINECT HD.  She has been an investigator in clinical research studies involving computerized cognitive rehab for people with HD and talking to children about their risk for HD.

Having Graduated from the McGill University Genetic Counselling program, Susan Conacher has now been a Genetic counsellor for over 30 years. After moving to London from Toronto in 2002 she took over the predicative genetic counselling program for Huntington Disease. This has now expanded into predictive genetic counselling for all adult neurodegenerative conditions. In addition she is the cardiac genetic counsellor for South Western Ontario.

Dr. Suchowersky is currently Professor of Medicine (Neurology), Medical Genetics, and Pediatrics at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Alberta

Dr. Suchowersky received her MD from University of Calgary. Following residency in Neurology and fellowship in Neurogenetics at University of British Columbia, Dr. Suchowersky was recruited to the University Of Calgary Faculty Of Medicine to develop the Movement Disorders Program in 1984. In 2010, she was recruited to the University of Alberta to expand the Movement Disorders and Neurogenetics Programs.

Her research interests include understanding genetic factors related to the development of neurodegenerative disorders including Huntington disease, and developing new treatments for these disorders. She has published over 250 peer reviewed publications, and edited 2 books. She is currently the director of the multidisciplinary Huntington Disease clinic at the U of A, and of the Neurogenetics and Predictive Testing clinics.

Dr. Tiago Mestre is a Neurologist and Movement disorder specialist. He is Associate professor in the University of Ottawa and scientist at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute. He cares for people living with HD based in the Movement Disorders clinic at the Ottawa Hospital.

He has research interest in HD, being the author of the first systematic review on therapeutic in HD, conducting multiple projects on development standards for rating scales and biomarkers to be used in clinical trials in HD. Currently, he is involved in Enroll-HD and clinical trials of gene-based therapies for HD.