1660 Hollis Street, Suite 905 | halifax, Nova Scotia | Canada B3J 1V7 |+ 1 (902) 424-3064
Dr. Gail Tomblin Murphy
Dr. Gail Tomblin Murphy (RN, PhD) is a Professor in the School of Nursing, Faculty of Health Professions and Department of Community Health and Epidemiology, Faculty of Medicine, Dalhousie University, and a Co-investigator at the Nursing Research Unit at the University of Toronto. Dr. Tomblin Murphy is the Director of the newly designated WHO Collaborating Centre Health Workforce Planning and Research, located at Dalhousie University. This centre is ideally suited to support the proposed activities as its mandate is to build capacity in needs-based health human resources planning, within Canada and internationally.
Dr. Tomblin Murphy’s contributions have been primarily in the area of health services with an emphasis on HHR planning through leadership in research, teaching, and work with governments, employers, unions, and professional associations. She is recognized as a leader in advancing scientific evidence on HHR and has demonstrated an ability to work with the academic community of teachers, educators and researchers as well as with decision-makers in the health policy community. She has made important academic contributions in developing a conceptual model for HHR planning and in establishing and implementing methods to conduct “needs-based planning”. In 2006 “needs-based planning” was adopted as the guiding framework for Pan-Canadian HHR policy and planning in Canada. Dr. Tomblin Murphy is also a member of the Board of Trustees of CHSRF, Chair of the the Nova Scotia Health Research Foundation (NSHRF’s) Capacity Building programs (Community Research Alliance and development grants), and works with NSHRF to build capacity in Health Service Research. She has worked closely with the Health Council of Canada, the CMA, CNA, HEAL, RCPS, CIHI, and other stakeholders to advance needs-based HHR planning.
Dr. Tomblin Murphy’s research has garnered widespread interest from governments and other stakeholders because of its significant influence on HHR planning policy in Canada and other countries. She has worked with a team to develop a needs-based model. The HHR conceptual model has been adapted for use by the Canadian Institute of Health Information (CIHI) and the WHO and is the basis of the Pan Canadian Framework. Dr. Tomblin Murphy has extensive experience working with senior policy-makers in the federal government and provincial governments, and senior decision-makers in health care organizations. She co-leads national and international research teams consisting of clinicians, health care leaders, senior policy-makers, and researchers from government, universities and health care organizations. Dr. Tomblin Murphy’s work has been widely published in peer-reviewed publications and as policy documents.
Dr. Tomblin Murphy has also demonstrated leadership in knowledge translation and linkage and exchange. She involves students and junior faculty where possible to participate in and learn from these initiatives. She is able to translate and communicate complex research material to a diverse audience of students, academics, professionals and policy-makers. Her knowledge and expertise was formally acknowledged in 2004 through an appointment as Science Lead for HHR by the CIHR (IHSPR). Her ability to secure and sustain productive partnerships has made her a welcome complement to high-level decision-making and advisory processes. Over the past five years, Dr. Tomblin Murphy has acted as an expert advisor on HHR issues to PAHO and WHO in the development of the World Health Report and PAHO’s Decade of HHR.