Leanne M. Ward, MD is a Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Ottawa, where she has held a Research Chair in Pediatric Bone Health since 2010. She is the Scientific Director of the Ottawa Pediatric Bone Health Research Group, the Medical Director of the Genetic and Metabolic Bone Disease Clinic at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO), and a pediatric endocrinologist in the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism at CHEO. Dr. Ward is also the Founder and Chair of the Canadian Consortium for Children’s Bone Health, a national working group dedicated to the care and study of children with bone disorders.
Leanne is actively involved in a number of clinical trials for children with bone fragility disorders such as osteogenesis imperfecta, rickets (including X-linked hypophosphatemia), and chronic illness osteoporosis. She has served as an endocrinology and bone health advisor to various international organizations including the Centers for Disease Control Clinical Care Considerations for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD), the International Late Effects of Childhood Cancer Guideline Harmonization Group, the International Society for Clinical Densitometry, Soft Bones Canada, Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy, and the International Conference on Children’s Bone Health.
Dr. Ward has been the principal investigator of the “STOPP” research program (STeroid-associated Osteoporosis in the Pediatric Population) since 2003, a pan-Canadian project funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research to evaluate the effect of glucocorticoids on bone health in children with chronic illnesses. This multi-center longitudinal research program has unveiled the natural history of osteoporotic fractures in children with steroid-treated disorders, including the clinical hallmark of this disorder in children, vertebral fractures. The results of the STOPP Consortium’s work under Dr. Ward’s leadership have played a major role in informing the approach to the diagnosis of steroid-induced osteoporosis in children, to the monitoring of those at risk, and in identifying children in need of osteoporosis prevention and intervention.
Dr. Ward has received a number of awards for her work in pediatric bone health, including a Canadian Child Health Clinician Scientist Career Development Award, a Canadian Institutes for Health Research New Investigator Award, a Canadian Child Health Clinician Scientist Career Enhancement Award, and three five-year Research Chairs in Pediatric Bone Disorders from the University of Ottawa (2010, 2015, and 2020).
In 2019, Dr. Ward was named a Fellow of the American Society of Bone and Mineral Research, an award in recognition of significant contributions to the Society, and to bone and mineral science.