Dr. Bercik graduated as MD from Charles University, Prague, Czechoslovakia. He obtained a fellowship from the Swiss National Foundation to work with Professors Pavel Kucera and Andre Blum at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, where he studied myogenic and neural control of gastrointestinal motility as a theme of his doctoral thesis. After clinical residency training in Charles University and the Central Military hospital in Prague, he worked as postdoctoral research and clinical fellow at McMaster University with Professor Stephen Collins focusing on animal models of functional gastrointestinal diseases and the role of low grade inflammation on gut function. Currently, he is Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine, Division of Gastroenterology, and director of Clinical Motility Laboratory and Celiac Clinic at McMaster University. His basic and clinical research, funded by CIHR and NIH, investigates the role of intestinal bacteria in gut-brain axis signaling, and its pathogenic importance in functional gastrointestinal diseases and gluten-related disorders. He has published over 80 peer-reviewed papers, with current h-index of 39.
