Connie Yang

Medical Director, Asthma Program

Project Investigator, Child Health Evaluative Sciences, SickKids Research Institute
Scientific Director, Ontario Asthma Surveillance Information System (OASIS)

Dr. Connie Yang completed her medical school at the University of Toronto, her paediatric residency at the University of Western Ontario and her Paediatric Respirology Fellowship at the University of Toronto.

Dr. Yang is the director of the Asthma Program for the Division of Respiratory medicine. She was previously a staff physician at the British Columbia Children's Hospital in Vancouver before joining the Division of Respiratory Medicine at SickKids in 2024.

She was the co-chair of the CTS Asthma Assembly Committee and has led the development of provincial and national Asthma guidelines. She was also the president of the Respiratory Health section of the
Canadian Paediatric Society where she helped disseminate unified information on pediatric respiratory health topics.

Research

Dr. Connie Yang is interested in improving the outcomes of children with asthma through clinical research and population-level data analysis. Her clinical research focuses on examining which children respond to different asthma treatments with the eventual goal of identifying the “treatable traits” in asthma to better target interventions. She is also interested in identifying risk factors for severe asthma outcomes, such as asthma attacks and asthma related death.

Education and experience

• 2025 – Present: Associate Professor, Paediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, ON, Canada
• 2024 – Present: Director, Asthma Program, Division of Respiratory Medicine, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, ON, Canada
• 2024 – Present: Paediatric Respirologist, Division of Respiratory Medicine, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, ON, Canada
• 2024 – Present: Project Investigator, Child Health Evaluative Sciences, SickKids Research Institute, Toronto, ON, Canada
• 2023 – 2024: Clinic Director, Children’s Interstitial Lung Disease Clinic, BC Children’s Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• 2023 – 2024: Medical Informatics Lead, BC Children’s Hospital Outpatient Care, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• 2019 – 2025: Clinical Associate Professor, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• 2014 – 2024: Clinic Director, Asthma Program, BC Children’s Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• 2012 – 2024: Pediatric Respirologist, Division of Respiratory Medicine, BC Children's Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• 2019 – 2020: Interim Division Head, Division of Pediatric Respirology, BC Children’s Hospital, Vancouver, BC, Canada
• 2010 – 2012: MSc, Institute of Medical Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
• 2008 – 2010: Fellowship, Pediatric Respirology, University of Toronto (The Hospital for Sick Children), Toronto, ON, Canada
• 2004 – 2008: Residency, Pediatrics, University of Western Ontario (Children's Hospital of Western Ontario), London, ON, Canada
• 2000 – 2004: MD, Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

1. Senior Responsible Author. Cook VE, Seear M, Carleton B, Yang CL. Which children are still dying from asthma? A 13 year review of pediatric asthma deaths in British Columbia, Canada. Pediatr Pulmonol. 2023 Jul;58(7):2166-2169. doi: 10.1002/ppul.26441. Epub 2023 May 3.
2. Principal Author. Yang, C. L., Hicks, E. A., Mitchell, P., Reisman, J., Podgers, D., Hayward, K. M., … Ramsey, C. D. (2021). Canadian Thoracic Society 2021 Guideline update: Diagnosis and management of asthma in preschoolers, children and adults. Canadian Journal of Respiratory, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine, 5(6), 348–361. https://doi.org/10.1080/24745332.2021.1945887
3. Senior Responsible Author. Yang CL, Simons E, Foty RG, Subbarao P, To T, Dell SD. Misdiagnosis of asthma in schoolchildren. Pediatr Pulmonol. 2017 Mar;52(3):293-302. doi: 10.1002/ppul.23541. Epub 2016 Aug 9. PMID: 27505297.
4. Co-Author. Forno E, Brandenburg DD, Castro-Rodriguez JA, Celis-Preciado CA, Holguin F, Licskai C, Lovinsky-Desir S, Pizzichini M, Teper A, Yang C, Celedón JC. Asthma in the Americas: An Update: A Joint Perspective from the Brazilian Thoracic Society, Canadian Thoracic Society, Latin American Thoracic Society, and American Thoracic Society. Ann Am Thorac Soc. 2022 Apr;19(4):525-535. doi: 10.1513/AnnalsATS.202109-1068CME.
5. Co-Author. Tejwani V, Chang HY, Tran AP, Naber JA, Gutzwiller FS, Winders TA, Khurana S, Sumino K, Mosnaim G, Moloney RM; coreASTHMA panel (Yang CL part of the coreASTHMA panel). A multistakeholder Delphi consensus core outcome set for clinical trials in moderate-to-severe asthma (coreASTHMA). Ann Allergy Asthma Immunol. 2021 Jul;127(1):116-122.e7. doi: 10.1016/j.anai.2021.03.022. Epub 2021 Mar 27.

See a full list of Dr. Yang's publications

Funding

• 2025 – 2026: CONNECTing Asthma outcomes and social determinants of health at an individual neighbourhood level (CONNECT-US), Principal Investigator, Department of Paediatrics CPA Grant Competition (The Hospital for Sick Children & Leong Centre, University of Toronto), $10,000 CAD
• 2024 – 2028: Developing a national approach to surveillance and prevention for neonatal ventilator-associated pneumonia, Co-investigator, Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR), $612,000 CAD
• 2024 – 2025: Predicting biologic therapy response in children with severe asthma: the Medication response and Asthma Therapy in CHildren with severe Asthma (MATCHA) Study, Co-investigator, Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR), $100,000 CAD
• 2024 – 2025: Pediatric severe asthma: integrating stakeholders’ perspectives in setting research priorities, Co-investigator, Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR), $20,000 CAD
• 2023 – 2028: Canadian Consortium for understanding the role of airway mucus occlusions in chronic cough, COPD and asthma (CANMuc), Co-investigator, Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR), $2,000,000 CAD
• 2022 – 2027: SPIRO (Spirometry for Improved Indigenous and Rural Respiratory Outcomes), Collaborator, Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR), $1,999,964 CAD