Dr. Rourke’s research involves novel and effective approaches to community stakeholder engagement, partnership development across disciplines and sectors, and innovative research-to-action strategies. By reaching the undiagnosed and those not in treatment or in care, his work is getting us closer to ending the HIV epidemic in Canada. Dr. Rourke completed a landmark clinical study to get the first HIV self-test approved in Canada in 2020. Since then, he has helped to get three more rapid point-of-care tests approved in Canada for HIV and syphilis testing.
Dr. Rourke is the director of two national centres funded by Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR): the CIHR Centre for REACH in HIV/AIDS, and the CIHR Community-Based Research Collaboration Centre for HIV, which support pragmatic solutions to address the HIV epidemics across Canada. In 2023, he launched Our Healthbox, a smart vending machine providing free, low-barrier access to HIV self-testing kits and wellness supplies, now active in 15+ Canadian communities. In 2025, Dr, Rourke and a team of Indigenous leaders, health experts and people with lived experiences launched The Ayaangwaamiziwin Centre – an Ojibwe word for “carefulness and preparedness.” This initiative will “test, treat and link to culturally safe care” at least 10,000 people at risk for HIV and/or syphilis in the Prairies and an additional 1,500+ people in Yukon, Nunavut and Northwest Territories.
He is a scientist with MAP Centre for Urban Health Solutions in the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute of St. Michael’s Hospital, and a professor of psychiatry at the University of Toronto.