Affiliation: University of Waterloo, School of Public Health and Health Systems

Understanding people’s eating patterns—including what they eat and drink and the contextual influences—is essential to better elucidating the diet-health nexus, as well as how to support eating patterns consistent with human and planetary health. The main focus of Dr. Kirkpatrick's work is on improving and disseminating strategies for appropriately collecting, analyzing, and interpreting dietary intake data. This work has been supported by a Capacity Development Award from the Canadian Cancer Society and an Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation Early Researcher Award, among other sources. Dr. Kirkpatrick's work also explores the utility of systems thinking and methods to better understand the array of factors that influence major nutrition challenges, and the effectiveness of interventions to address these challenges, as well as unintended consequences of well-meaning policies. She works with colleagues and trainees to advance these areas, with a growing focus on planetary, in addition to, human health. Furthermore, she has long-standing interests in food access among marginalized populations.