NNC Faculty Instructor, UTSCS
Dr. Gardner-Nix was a Chronic Pain Consulting Physician, Department of Anaesthesia, Pain Clinic, St Michael’s Hospital until 2018, and is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Anaesthesia, University of Toronto. She is also on courtesy staff at Northumberland Hills Hospital, Cobourg.
She trained in the renowned Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program in the USA in 2001.
From 2002, Dr. Gardner-Nix evolved the Mindfulness-Based Chronic Pain Management (MBCPM™) program from the MBSR program, customizing it to the needs of those suffering from chronic pain. She wrote, narrated and produced recorded meditations to accompany the course and authored the book “The Mindfulness Solution to Pain: A Step by Step Guide for Working With Chronic Pain”, also used in the MBCPM™ courses.
Thousands of chronic pain sufferers across Ontario have taken the MBCPM™ programs, learning skills for changing their relationship with pain, suffering and stress, and developing new “habits” which involve neuroplastic changes in the brain. She extended MBCPM™ courses to patients attending many health facilities across Ontario using the Ontario Telemedicine Network (OTN), and, since 2012, trained other health care professionals to facilitate the courses. She also developed and added alumni courses.
She has given many presentations on chronic pain management internationally and has researched outcomes showing effectiveness of the MBCPM™ courses in those suffering chronic pain and stress. She established NeuroNova Centre for Mindful Solutions Inc (NNC), which creates and publishes materials for the MBCPM™ courses, and, in collaboration with the University of Toronto School of Continuing Studies (UTSCS), trains, mentors, and accredits new facilitators. Currently MBCPM™ courses are being delivered by a growing number of other health care professionals (including MDs, psychologists, occupational therapists, social workers) across Ontario, and the world. Her work was reported on CBC News in December 2012 and on CTV news in April 2013.
She lives with her husband in Port Hope, Ontario, Canada and enjoys their six grandchildren.