Rakhshan Kamran

I am an MD/PhD (DPhil, Oxon) candidate at the University of Oxford, attending as a Clarendon Scholar (top 1% of Oxford students). I am also a full-time staff member at Oxford where I am a Chief Investigator and NIHR Doctoral Research Fellow (first Canadian and medical student to be awarded this) and leading a programme of research to implement patient-reported outcome measurement in gender-affirming care. In total, I secured $1 million in funding as Chief Investigator prior to starting my doctoral studies.

Concurrent to my PhD, I am completing a bespoke and fully-funded training program at world top-ten institutions across four countries (United States, United Kingdom, Canada, the Netherlands). This includes a fellowship in artificial intelligence at Harvard University, and training with: the University of Cambridge Judge Business School, University College London, the University of Leeds, Amsterdam University Medical Center, King’s College London, the University of Toronto, and Imperial College London. 

I have been formally recognised for performing at the highest clinical and research standards. I have been involved with health services research since 2015, with my first publication at the age of 18 being the first ever rapid review (published in the BMJ). One of my peer-reviewed publications, for which I was lead author on (https://doi.org/10.1093/pch/pxaa109), was recognised by the Canadian Paediatric Society with the Dr. Noni MacDonald award (first and only medical student to be awarded this) as the top paper which positively impacted paediatrics in 2021. In 2022, I was an inductee to the Canadian Paediatric Society Hall of Fame.

I am the recipient of over 30 awards, including the Impact in Community Outreach, Prevention, and Advocacy Award, the highest provincial honour bestowed by the Canadian Cancer Society (for co-founding and leading a group which successfully lobbied Ontario parliament to pass Bill 45: Making Healthier Choices Act), the Scotiabank Breast Cancer Research Award, the June Callwood Harmony Award, the Herbert H. Carnegie Future Aces Citizenship Award and the Paul Rabinowitz Award in Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery.

I am also named one of the top 20 LGBTQ+ leaders in Canada by the LOUD Foundation and the top LGBTQ+ student leader in Canada by GoFreddie. In 2022, I  received the Paving the Way Award from the University of Oxford, selected from over 250 nominations, which recognises innovative or original approaches to activism, campaign and student representation, and achieving outstanding results.