The University of Alberta Faculty of Law is very pleased to announce that Professor Gerald B. Robertson, Q.C., the Katz Group Chair in Health Law, has been chosen by the University as one of its two recipients of this year's J. Gordin Kaplan Award for Excellence in Research.
The Kaplan Award is the most prestigious University of Alberta award for research excellence, bestowed on its faculty whose achievements in research are deemed outstanding by experts in their respective fields.
This is the second occasion on which a member of the Faculty of Law has received the Kaplan Award since the Award's inception in 1982, the other being Professor Lewis Klar, Q.C., in 2007.
Professor Robertson's area of research is health law, and he is recognized nationally and internationally as a leading scholar in that field. He was educated at the University of Edinburgh and McGill University, and was appointed to the Faculty of Law in 1983 as an associate professor, and as full professor in 1988. Since that time he has been actively involved in the development and activities of the University's Health Law Institute.
Professor Robertson is a past recipient of the Honourable Tevie H. Miller Teaching Excellence Award, the Law Society of Alberta/Canadian Bar Association Distinguished Service Award for Legal Scholarship, the McCalla Research Professorship, and the American Society of Law & Medicine Rattigan Award. He has been a member of the Alberta Bar (Law Society of Alberta) since 1989, and was appointed as Queen's Counsel in 2000. In 2011 Professor Robertson was appointed as the inaugural Katz Group Chair in Health Law in the Faculty of Law.
Among his many health law publications, Professor Robertson is co-author (with Madam Justice Ellen Picard, of the Court of Appeal of Alberta)) of the textbook Legal Liability of Doctors and Hospitals in Canada, now in its 4th edition (soon to be its 5th). This book is widely regarded as the most authoritative and comprehensive treatment of medical malpractice law in Canada, and has been cited and relied upon on numerous occasions by courts in every province in Canada, as well as by the Supreme Court of Canada and courts in many other jurisdictions. Professor Robertson's other textbooks include Mental Disability and the Law in Canada (2nd ed.), and Elder Abuse and Neglect in Canada (co-author). In addition, Professor Robertson has published extensively in legal and medical journals in Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom. He has also authored several law reform reports published by the Alberta Law Reform Institute, in the area of enduring powers of attorney and health care directives, which were the basis of Alberta legislation in these areas.
Professor Robertson reacted to the news of his Kaplan Award by saying, "I am deeply honoured to have received the Kaplan Award. And I am very thankful to have been given the opportunity to come to, and be a part of, the University of Alberta and its Faculty of Law, where there is an environment which strongly encourages and facilitates research excellence".
Philip Bryden, Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Alberta, said, "I am delighted that Gerald Robertson's outstanding contributions to health law research have been recognized by the University of Alberta through the Kaplan Award. Professor Robertson is a pioneer of health law research in Canada, and he has played a key role in developing a field of research in which the Faculty of Law at the University of Alberta is an international leader."
J. Gordin Kaplan, the first Vice-President (Research) at the University of Alberta, created the University Research Prize, which was first presented in 1982. The University Research Prize was renamed in 1988 in order to pay special tribute to the memory of J. Gordin Kaplan.