Barbara Secker, PhD
Director, Education and Practice
Telephone: (416) 978-1909
Email: barbara.secker@utoronto.ca 
Barbara Secker directs the Joint Centre for Bioethics Clinical, Organizational and Research Ethics (CORE) Network, its postgraduate Academic Fellowship in Clinical and Organizational Ethics, the Masters in Bioethics Program, and the graduate Collaborative Program in Bioethics at the University of Toronto. She is a faculty member in the Department of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy, the Graduate Department of Rehabilitation Science, and the Department of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation. Dr. Secker received her BA from the University of Toronto, her MA (Philosophy) from Simon Fraser University and her PhD through the University of Toronto's Department of Philosophy with a specialization in bioethics through the Collaborative Program in Bioethics.
From 1998-2008, Dr. Secker was employed by the Toronto Rehabilitation Institute where she developed, implemented and lead a comprehensive ethics program that included: research on ethical questions related to disability, rehab and community care; consulting on clinical, research, and organizational ethical issues; facilitating bioethics education; policy review and development; research ethics review; and leadership and program administration. From 2004-present Accreditation Canada has designated Toronto Rehab's capacity-building "hub-and-spokes" strategy for clinical ethics service delivery a national "leading practice."
Dr. Secker teaches the philosophical bioethics course for the MHSc in Bioethics program, and co-teaches Occupational Therapy Practice II (which dedicates roughly half its classes to ethics issues in OT practice) in the OT professional masters program. She is also collaborating with others to continue to develop core curricula for postgraduate fellows in clinical and organizational ethics, and for ethics facilitators, ethics committee members and staff in health care organizations.
Her primary areas of interest are: (1) patient autonomy and decision-making capacity in health and research contexts, (2) disability, rehabilitation and community care ethics, and (3) ethics program innovation, development and evaluation. She is Co-Principal Investigator (with Dr. Barbara Gibson) on a CIHR funded research project titled There's No Place Like Home: What Constitutes an 'Adequate' Home Environment for Younger Adults with Physical Disabilities?
