Dr. Girish Kulkarni
(MD, PhD, FRCSC)

Dr. Kulkarni completed his medical school and residency in urology at the University of Toronto. During his residency, he entered the Surgeon Scientist Training Program and completed his PhD in clinical epidemiology through the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation. He then completed a fellowship in urologic oncology at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City. Dr. Girish Kulkarni joined the uro-oncology faculty in 2011 and is a urologic surgeon in the Department of Surgical Oncology at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network. He is also a surgeon-scientist who is affiliated with the Department of Surgery, Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto. At the University of Toronto, he is an associate professor in the Department of Surgery, as well as at the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Education. He also holds a senior adjunct scientist position at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences. Dr. Kulkarni’s main clinical interests are in bladder and prostate cancer. He is also highly involved in the management of “orphan” genitourinary malignancies including urothelial carcinoma of the upper tract and penile carcinoma. Dr. Kulkarni’s primary research interests revolve around the epidemiology of genitourinary malignancies, particularly bladder cancer. His investigations are dedicated towards the understanding of population-level quality of care of urologic malignancies, quality of life and the health economics associated with urologic malignancies. He is also actively involved in clinical trials and is the site principal investigator for numerous non-muscle invasive and muscle invasive bladder cancer trials at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre. He is an active member of Bladder Cancer Canada and serves on its medical advisory board. Examples of his innovative work in bladder cancer include the development and validation of the Bladder Utility Symptom Scale (BUSS), which is a health related quality of life tool that helps clinicians rapidly measure quality of life in all bladder cancer patients and which will help policy makers determine the cost-effectiveness of bladder cancer treatments. This instrument is being adopted into clinical practice worldwide. He has also promoted the use of bladder-sparing trimodal therapy for patients with muscle invasive bladder cancer and is an established member of the University Health Network’s Multidisciplinary Bladder Cancer Clinic. His work in bladder cancer has been presented at multiple national and international meetings and is currently funded by the Canadian Institutes for Health Research.