Dr. Gontovnick is Vice President, Research and Development at WEX Pharmaceuticals in Vancouver. He oversees the clinical development of WEX’s lead product (Tetrodotoxin-TTX) for chronic cancer-related pain and for prolonged local anaesthesia.
Dr. Gontovnick has over 25 years of experience in drug development in biotech and big pharma. He was Vice President, Drug Development at Twinstrand Therapeutics (2003-2008) and Vice President, Clinical Development and Regulatory Affairs at Cipher Pharmaceuticals (2002-2003), where he was responsible for the clinical programs and regulatory filings for several novel investigational drug products. He was Senior Director, Clinical Development at GlaxoSmithKline (1992-2001), where he led a department of 150 scientific and administrative staff that represented Canada on global clinical development teams and was responsible for the conduct of international and local clinical trials in Canada. He also served as Head, Clinical Investigation at CIBA-Geigy Canada (1985-1992), where he was a member of the international development team for formoterol, a long-acting inhaled β2-agonist.
Dr. Gontovnick received his Ph.D. degree in pharmacology from the University of British Columbia where he was a graduate student in the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences. He was a Medical Research Council of Canada Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Wisconsin’s McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research and an Edward Christie Stevens Postdoctoral Fellow at the Ontario Cancer Institute. He was an Assistant Professor (part-time) at the Faculty of Health Sciences, McMaster University (1992-1995) and a Visiting Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of British Columbia (1988). He is a member of the Canadian Society of Pharmacology and Therapeutics.