Tilak Dutta

All of us are likely to have a personal experience with a disabling illness or injury in our lives. Either we will experience disability ourselves or we will provide care to someone with a disability.

Dr. Dutta is a Senior Scientist at KITE and directs the Engineering Health team to use engineering approaches to improve the health of people with disabilities and their caregivers by:

• Improving accessibility for individuals with disabilities
  1. Improving accessibility/egressability of the built environment and accessibility of parks and air travel
  2. Improving safety and usability of intersections for people with mobility-related disabilities
• Supporting the care of individuals with disabilities
  1. Preventing caregiver back injuries and developing training tools and methods
  2. Preventing pressure injuries
• Preventing fall-related injuries for people with disabilities and their caregivers
  1. Preventing slips on icy surfaces
  2. Preventing trips on outdoor walkways

Dr. Dutta’s health research complements the work that clinicians traditionally do to support their patients (e.g., focusing on the individual patient to improve balance, strength, cardiovascular health etc). Dr. Dutta’s team complements the work of these clinicians by considering many of the other factors in the individual’s environment that can impact their health negatively. This work includes removing accessibility/safety barriers in the environment to encourage activity and engagement in their communities.

Dr. Dutta leads a multidisciplinary team of 20 talented staff and trainees including engineers, clinicians and social scientists. Dr. Dutta’s work has resulted in a range of practical tools, products, standards, guidelines, training videos, and communities of practice that are having positive impacts on people with disabilities and their caregivers. Tilak's team designs, builds, tests, refines and translates/commercializes their outputs in collaboration with a wide range of stakeholders including people with lived experience with disability, industry partners and policy makers.

Tilak holds faculty appointments at the Institute of Biomedical Engineering and the Rehabilitation Sciences Institute at the University of Toronto.