Backgrounder on Highlighted Projects

CIHR National Funding Announcement - Spring 2008

[ News Release 2008-11 ]

Breathing easier with a healthy heart - $642,420 over 4 years
Newborns who experience oxygen deprivation at birth or shortly after can be resuscitated, by giving them supplemental oxygen. The problem is, however, that many of them go on to develop poor heart function. Dr. Po-Yin Cheung of the University of Alberta, wants to know whether it is the oxygen deprivation or the treatment that can lead to poor heart function. And he will examine different ways to treat the oxygen deprivation without the infants' developing heart trouble.

Preventing cervical cancer in HIV-positive women - $1,389,043 over 5 years
Women who are HIV-positive have higher rates of Human Papillomavirus (HPV) infection and the infection progresses to cervical cancer more quickly than in other women. Yet, the HPV vaccine, which has been approved in Canada since 2006, has not been studied in these women. Dr. Deborah Money of the University of British Columbia and Women's Health Research Institute, with a large team of co-investigators and collaborators across Canada, will evaluate how HIV-positive women respond to the HPV vaccine, to learn how the vaccine acts in these women, what its side effects are and whether it provides long-term protection against HPV. Her research will help ensure vulnerable women in Canada have appropriate vaccination programs. It will also provide vitally needed information for implementing HPV vaccine programs in the developing world, where HIV infection is widespread and where access to Pap screening is limited, making cervical cancer a leading cause of death among women.

Bringing a made-to-measure approach to Indigenous health - $933,191 over 5 years
There's no such thing as one-size-fits-all in the health arena. In fact, one of the reasons that First Nations and Métis children and their families don't enjoy the same good personal and community health as other Canadians is that the people who provide their health care don't have the information they need - information that fits local needs and local culture - to do their jobs. Dr. Janet Smylie of St. Michael's Hospital, University of Toronto, will test a new way to help health planners, managers and workers in First Nations and Métis communities get the information they need, so they can use it in their local parenting and child health programs. She will build on informal networks that already exist to create a more structured Indigenous Knowledge Network. Network members will combine cultural information from their home communities and scientific information from project scientists to improve parenting and child health programs, thus contributing to improvements in personal and community health among First Nations and Métis people in Canada.

Treating cancer with magnetic force - $218,913 over 3 years
Drugs used to treat cancer would work much better if they could be delivered directly inside the tumours. Dr. Sylvain Martel of the École polytechnique de Montréal of the University of Montreal will develop a new way to send microbeads carrying an anticancer drug through blood stream and straight to tumours in the liver. As well as the drug, the microbeads will also contain extremely small magnetic particles, making them behave like tiny magnets. A magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner will act as a large magnetic field around the patient, allowing the machines to see the microbeads, propel them and navigate them precisely where they are supposed to go, fighting cancer much more effectively.