Catherine Litalien

Catherine Litalien

Pediatric Intensivist and Medical Director, Clinical Pharmacology Unit, CHU Sainte-Justine Research Centre (Montréal, QC)

September 18, 2014

Catherine Litalien is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at Université de Montréal and a full time pediatric intensivist in the Division of Pediatric Critical Care Medicine at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Sainte-Justine in Montréal, Quebec. She is also the medical director of the Clinical Pharmacology Unit at the CHU Sainte-Justine Research Centre. The primary goals of this unit are to assist clinicians in the personalization of drug treatment by providing pharmacological data in a “real-time” fashion (“real-time pharmacology”) and to facilitate the conduct of pediatric trials for medicinal products in children.

Her research focus is on the use of modelling and simulation to better identify factors responsible for the important variability observed in the disposition of drugs in the pediatric population and to describe pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic relationships. More recently, she has been working on the development of new monitoring tools for immunosuppressant drugs in pediatric solid organ and hematopoietic transplant recipients.

Dr. Litalien earned her MD at McGill University, and completed her pediatric residency at CHU Sainte-Justine, Université de Montréal. She did her post-doctoral training in pediactric intensive care at both Université de Montreal and Stanford University. She also trained in clinical pharmacology under the supervision of Professor Evelyne Jacqcz-Aigrain in the Laboratoire de pharmacologie clinique pédiatrique et pharmacogénétique, Hôpital Robert Debré, Paris, France.

Dr. Litalien is a member of numerous scientific societies including the Canadian Pediatric Society, l’Association des Pédiatres du Québec, the Canadian Society of Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics and the Society of Critical Care Medicine. She is a fellow of The Royal College of Physicians of Canada. She is a reviewer for journals such as Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, Pediatric Drugs, Drug Safety and Clinical Biochemistry. Since 2011, she is a member of the Paediatric Expert Advisory Committee of Health Canada. She has published more than 20 peer-reviewed articles and numerous abstracts dealing with drugs in children.


Role: Panel Member
Report: Improving Medicines for Children in Canada (September 2014)