Minutes - 25th Institute Advisory Board (IAB) Meeting - Institute of Cancer Research

Date: February 5-6, 2009

Place: Fairmont Waterfront Vancouver

Present:

IAB Members
  1. Ron Barr
  2. Angela Brooks-Wilson
  3. Heather Bryant (Chair)
  4. Jacques Corbeil
  5. Richard Doll
  6. Elizabeth Eisenhauer
  7. Margaret Fitch
  8. Scott Leatherdale
  9. Anne-Marie Mes-Masson
  10. Ben Neel
  11. Cheryl Robertson

      Guests
      1. Francois Benard
      2. John Challis
      3. Connie Eaves
      4. Darrell Fox
      5. Victor Ling
      6. Thea Tlsty
      7. Michael Wosnick (NCIC)

          CIHR and ICR Staff
          1. Judy Bray
          2. Diane Christin
          3. Dale Dempsey
          4. Jaime Flamenbaum
          5. David Hartell
          6. Benoît Lussier
          7. Gwendoline Malo
          8. Claudia Mongeon
          9. Morag Park (Scientific Director)
          10. Stephanie Pineda
          11. Diana Sarai

              Regrets
              1. William Mackillop
              2. Les Mery
              3. Mark Nachtigal
              4. Steve Pillipow
              5. Michael Tyers
              6. Kimberly Banks Hart (maternity leave)

                  DAY 1: Thursday, February 5, 2009

                  Review of Café Scientifique on Cancer Stem Cells

                  Dr. Heather Bryant called the meeting to order at 8:30 a.m. and asked participants to introduce themselves. Dr. Wosnick announced his new appointment with CCS as the VP Research and Scientific Director of the Canadian Cancer Society Research Institute. A discussion took place on yesterday's event, the first café scientifique organized by ICR on the topic of cancer stem cells. There were three invited speakers introduced by Dr. Morag Park: Dr. Thea Tlsty from UCSF in US, Dr. Connie Eaves from Terry Fox Laboratory in Vancouver and Dr. Ben Neel, an IAB Member of ICR. About 75-100 people attended this event, including some IAB members. The audience was mainly composed of 80% research students and postdoctoral fellows, and 20% general public. Speakers were then invited to attend the IAB meeting this morning to express their opinions about cancer stem cells and help ICR in its decision-process for funding opportunities. IAB members appreciated this input from speakers.

                  • Dr. Eaves gave her impressions about this event. She outlined the great presence of students as opposed to the general public, due most probably to the scientific nature of the topic. One comment from the general public was that it is too early in the science to talk about cancer stem cells and too theoretic; people wanted to hear about results. She further discussed about the frequency of cancer stem cells and the difference between US and Canada on existing networks for collecting and annotating tissues. In this regard, the Canadian healthcare system represents many advantages. One must recognize these assets and mobilize them. She stressed the following points: 1) recognize opportunities and assets, 2) invest funds on these assets, 3) work as a community, build networks (no hierarchy), 4) build on Training, and 5) reduce bureaucracy in funding application as researchers need stable funding. 

                  • Dr. Tlsty talked about epigenetics as the most emerging area in cancer stem cells (how the DNA sequence is packaged). There are opportunities in cross knowledge (between students in CIRM and here in Canada) and translational research to make this research a reality. A collection of tissues with proper annotations is important in doing experiments that would make a breakthrough in KT.

                  • Dr. Neel also agrees with Dr. Eaves on many points, specifically on the issue of improving electronic health recording to the bank tissues as it is currently lacking.

                  Call to Order

                  Drs. Eaves and Tlsty left the meeting and Dr. Bryant proceeded with IAB matters. Minutes of the previous IAB meeting were approved with a correction on the section about the UICC international meeting. This meeting agenda was approved with the addition of public representation on IAB meetings by Cheryl Robertson.

                  ICR Budgets and Financial Reports

                  Dr. Lussier presented the ISI budget.

                  • ICR will fund 3 full STIHR grants without partners.
                  • The CTRNet grant has been re-profiled so this group will receive $1M next year. Re-profiling occurs when large amounts of unspent funds are sitting in University accounts at the beginning of the fiscal year; therefore, in order to minimize the unspent balance, payments to 5-yr grants will be deferred over the remaining years. Since funding CTRNet was delayed due to the ethics approval process, the group could not spend the funds on time. Each grantee has approximately a full year to spend the remaining amount.
                  • CTCRI will be funded for phase III at $500K per year for 5 years. Dr. Wosnick indicated that the structure of CTCRI might change in the future; therefore some of the funding might return.
                  • The cancer stem cells (CSC) initiative has funding commitments in the order of $5M over 5 years and CIHR is matching this amount. Dr. Park mentioned that an announcement will be made next week about CSC.
                  • Next year's budget will be $8.5M; however, the latest federal budget might have some implications for the Institute budgets. Assuming the present scenario remains, ICR will have about $250K next year to spend on various initiatives. Since we cannot carry-over the balance of funds, we have been bridge-funding operating grants.
                  • There are yet no decisions made about moving forward with the PEOL initiative.

                  Overview of Existing Priorities

                  A note was made about the new look of ICR's slide templates which will be standardized across the various means of communications.

                  David Hartell summarized ICR's funding initiatives:

                  • 22 STIHR grants for $13.3M
                  • 4 teams in Molecular and Functional imaging for over $1.3M and POP grants launched in December 2008
                  • 6 pilot projects and 2 NETs in Early Detection of Cancer for $6M, and POP grants launched in Dec. 2008
                  • Clinical Trials for $3.5M with the Clinical Trials Group (CTG) at NCIC; this partnership is ending shortly
                  • Risk behaviour: CTCRI and target obesity initiative with INMD.
                  • Molecular profiling of tumours (CTRNet) for $3,8M over 6 years starting 2004-5 and ending 2009-10. These funds were deferred twice and extended once for a 6th year. The renewal process has been discussed at CIHR and grantees will be asked to generate a progress report. As of fall 2008, there is a new procedure for renewal grant applications "Directed Grant" which allows for a site review. The final decision for CTRNet will be made in March 2010. CTRNet helps tumour banks organize best practices and standard operating procedures (SOP); they don't own any banks but can form partnerships.
                  • 7 new Emerging Team Grants in Access to Quality Cancer Care for a total of $10M. Both researchers and end users were involved in the teams. A teleconference took place on January 15th during which participants acknowledged the need for networking and for a larger meeting with other stakeholders. A one-day meeting is planned to be held in the fall 2009 for the teams (5 per team) with other satellite meetings.

                  Dr. Bray expressed the desire to have a motion and vote on the next steps of the PEOL initiative, in which ICR has invested $16.5M with the collaboration of 16 partners. This made Canada a worldwide leader in PEOL. Grants are ending in 2009-10 and ICR will be expected to show the impact of this initiative in the next international review in 2011. The context of aging baby boomers makes PEOL an increasing need. She has 3 proposals for discussions:

                  1. End of grant report evaluation (see handout). A draft of the report was submitted to IAB members for comments and several recommendations were made. KT questions were added as opposed to the first mid-term report. It was also suggested to add questions about social impacts and ask about their specific needs. Is the impact of this initiative too early to assess? Also, essential questions should be asked before general identification questions such as name, etc. and page limits should also be applied. This evaluation might involve more than a questionnaire so the need to recruit someone for this task was suggested.
                  2. Support of KT activities. Judy suggests funding the teams to apply for the CIHR open competitions.
                  3. Funding of a national PEOL consortium. Dr. Bray proposes that ICR invests $100,000 to start the process of inciting partners to collaborate. It would be worth doing a survey of partners to get support of a national PEOL Consortium and funding commitments.

                  Paediatric Survivorship Initiative

                  ICR had decided survivorship would be a priority but then shifted its focus on paediatric and young adult cancer research. Health issues for the age group of 15-39 years (young adult) are very different than for children of 0-14 years and are rather neglected, which makes it an interesting area for ICR to invest. The focus of the catalyst grants launched in December is on biomedical and clinical aspects of survivorship. Should ICR re-focus its investment in paediatric rather than survivorship in general? A one-day meeting is organized on March 9th, 2009 between the various partners across the country working on paediatrics, such as POGO, Childhood cancer foundation, etc.

                  New Directions and Transition for the MSFHR

                  Dr. John Challis thanked the Advisory Board for inviting him. He was recruited 6 months ago by the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research (MSFHR) as the new President and CEO. He gave a brief history of the organization which was established in 2001 with the mandate to build health research capacity. He illustrated the CIHR Funding to the main provinces and mentioned that BC is finally obtaining greater funds compared to the provinces of Alberta and Ontario. About 1,000 trainees and 285 career investigators have been funded from 2001-02 to 2008-09 and about 30% of MSFHR funds are geared to cancer research. He also explained the position of MSFHR within the context of the changes in the external environment. There is an increased call by key stakeholders for accountability and return on investment, and the necessity to fund programs of relevance to health issues of BC and to collaborate with funding partners and end user stakeholders. MSFHR is moving towards a more strategic research agency to respond rapidly to urgent issues and emerging priority with partnerships. MSFHR is also currently developing a strategic plan 2009-2015 which will be finalized in July. He ended his presentation with a video clip on the achievements of MSFHR and by inviting ICR for partnership. He has accepted Dr. Eisenhauer's invitation to attend a Town Hall in Vancouver, in the month of April, as part of the CCRA national strategic plan. He will also be contacted by Dr. Bray for the paediatric and young adult workshop.

                  Knowledge Translation Strategies

                  The IG report on KT strategies and the management response was recommended as a reference for ICR to build its own KT strategy. Some KT roles that ICR could undertake include: 1) training and increasing capacity; 2) knowledge/broker facilitator; 3) evaluation, impact assessment and next steps; and 4) dissemination of best practices. Next steps in the short term could include a synthesis of KT context in cancer research community and a casebook with cancer related cases. Activities in the mid to long term could include a KT prize, a KT Summer Institute or a large event, etc. It was commented that KT should not rest on the shoulders of new investigators or researchers for lack of time but POP grants for example could be used as a means for handling KT issues to facilitate uptake of information for Pillars 2, 3 and 4. Some of the KT activities could be paid out of the ISG grant, for example casebook, synthesis, etc.

                  Update on the Cancer Operating Grants Competition

                  Dale Dempsey summarized four open competitions and the four review committees aligned with ICR. He indicated that budget cuts increased by about 5%.

                  1. Cancer Biology and Therapeutics (CBT): 13 of 36 applications were funded in the first competition in March 2007 (26.5%) compared to 11 of the 36 applications in September 2007.
                  2. Cancer Progression and Therapeutics (CPT): funding also decreased from 26% to 20%.
                  3. Molecular and Cell Biology of Cancer (MCC): relatively stable.
                  4. PEOL committee: funding progressed from 25% to 31%. Mr. Dempsey explained that more applications must be submitted in this area.

                  He noted that the average cut-off rate differs greatly between the committees, i.e. CBT and CPT are more conservative in their scores as opposed to MCC and PLC who score higher. Budget cuts however are identical throughout the grants. Some concerns were expressed about grants that reapply after the panel recommendations but that are still under the cut-off rate at the 2nd round of the competition. CIHR is striving to have best practices and consults with other agencies such as NIH; it ensures that panel review members have the necessary expertise.

                  New ICR Strategic Priorities and Directions

                  Dr. Park summarized the priorities based on the discussion of the May 2008 strategic priority planning meeting with stakeholders and the September 2008 IAB meeting. She indicated that CIHR is striving at building initiatives jointly with Institutes. IAB Members were invited to reflect on these new priorities in addition to the existing ones, such as CTRNet, for a final decision on ICR's future funding directions.

                  1. Systems biology: Catalyst grants were initiated; the deadline for LOIs is this month and a final decision will be rendered in March. The goal was to identify interest in the community, more specifically with regard to bioinformatics. Other Institutes such as III and IG are interested in systems biology, which is a rather broad terminology and some members have given other suggestions of names to narrow it down, for example, computational biology, systems biomedicine, bio-computational science. ICR is interested in funding STIHRs in this area and a workshop is not necessary. Career-transition awards would be appropriate, as well as a Chair program, to recruit someone from outside the country if necessary.
                  2. Metastasis-tumour microenvironment. CIHR is also focusing on inflammation and immunity and III, IMHA and ICRH have an interest in this area. Should ICR join forces with these institutes and organize a workshop?
                  3. Survivorship: Dr. Doll organized a workshop in this area and catalyst grants were launched by ICR on the biomedical aspects of survivorship. Funders interested to partner are in the field of paediatrics and young adult. Canada could be the home for paediatric genome sequencing. There is a meeting in March that will establish a plan of action for paediatrics and young adult survivorship so ICR should wait until then before making decisions. Some concerns were expressed about selecting a group within the population to focus on the issue of survivorship.
                  4. Translational research. D. Thomas has given a talk to the IAB in the past on chemical biology. It was noted that translation research should also encompass pillar 2 activities. Does ICR have enough funds for this?

                  Update on the Terry Fox Research Institute

                  TFF launched TFRI in October 2007 after a consultation with the cancer research community on the best use of funds from its 25th anniversary run. The decision was to focus on translational research. TFRI will link major cancer centres via nodes across the country with an investment of $50M over 5 years. TFRI also seeks co-funding of projects with other organizations such as CPACC, ACB and OICR. They currently have a staff of 3 people including Dr. Ling.

                  Dr. Ling explained the reasons that led TFRI to focus on translational research. It wants to make the most impact in cancer outcomes. Translational research is under funded and innovation is needed in the cancer control system. There are multiple barriers in cultural, regulatory and financial matters as the public believes translation happens automatically. An infrastructure must be built with strong team science, which is currently not a priority in the academic and funding environment.

                  Dr. Branton chairs the scientific advisory committee of TFRI. Dr. Ling welcomes suggestions of other members to join this committee and he listed the current partners across the provinces. TFRI's views of translational cancer research are driven by clinical or population health questions and needs to be accelerated by milestone driven business.

                  TFRI will focus on large scale projects involving patient material or data which must have measurable outcomes. There are currently 16 projects @ $15M of which the majority are pilot projects. These large projects necessitate a 3-month process to be launched. He cited the early detection of lung cancer in partnership with CPACC ($6.6M) as an example of a large scale project. The strategy is to evaluate a multimodal approach towards screening. This study will provide info on key screening parameters and health care costs, which is critical information in the decision-making process of selecting a program to implement across Canada.

                  A first annual meeting will take place on May 22-24, 2009 in Vancouver to gather node and project leaders that will share their information and progress. A workshop will also be organized to dialogue with policy makers and health authorities.

                  Future projects include ovarian cancer, brain cancer, prostate cancer, lymphoma, leukemia and other tumour sites. TFRI is also planning new partnerships with CTRNet and nodes in Atlantic and Prairies. TRFI wants to encourage trainees in translational cancer research and initiate dialogues on how best to translate today's science to significantly improve tomorrow's cancer outcomes.

                  There are 4,000 TF runs around the world and in some states the money remains in the country but TFF has the final decision on how these funds are spent. TFF is also looking at having delegates from these countries participate in future annual meetings.

                  Dr. Ling is inviting suggestions for collaborations with ICR. In the next year or two, TFRI will focus on tumour sites. He mentioned the transfer of the research funding program from NCIC to CIHR and highlighted the important contributions of NCIC in the New Frontiers Program.

                  The meeting on Day 1 was adjourned at 5:10 p.m.


                  Top of Page

                  DAY 2: Friday, February 6, 2009

                  Call to Order

                  Dr. Heather Bryant called the meeting to order at 8:30 a.m.

                  Cancer Imaging in Canada

                  Dr. François Bénard thanked Dr. Park for inviting him to give an overview of cancer imaging in Canada to the Advisory Board. He talked about clinical cancer care mainly and some research. Ongoing initiatives in the country involve three main modalities (sometimes called functional imaging of cancer):

                  • Nuclear based techniques
                  • MRI based methods
                  • Optical methods

                  His expertise is in radiotracers which is the closest area to clinical translation. There are about 16-17 PET scanning centres across the country which strive at improving precision of scanning for better diagnosis. The objective is to personalize medicine, to tailor drug dosage to individual patients, characterize cancers by using predictive biomarkers, predict response to targeted therapies an asses treatment response rapidly to switch regimen in case of failure. Dr. Bénard showed an example with a lymphoma and oestrogen receptor imaging in metastatic breast cancer. There are also short-term clinical translation projects in prostate cancer imaging, bone metastasis imaging, DNA synthesis. Many compounds can be put in immediate use.

                  A network of 14 centres in Canada, collaborating on imaging projects, is in place and is increasingly growing. It does not only involve cancer research. TFRI is collaborating as well with a $60M proposal. These centres have a great interest in sharing knowledge and building a multi-centre approach. There are also several commercial partners such as MDS Nordion (radiotracers) and Advanced Cyclotron Systems. Dr. Bénard is looking to build collaborations with CIHR-ICR, CTG and CCRA.

                  Frequency of IAB Meetings

                  Dr. Park suggested holding only two IAB meetings per year, around May and November, to last 2 days instead of 1.5 depending on the workload. She also recommended creating subcommittees to work on the various priorities. Members were in favour.

                  Strategic Plan II 2009-2014

                  ICR's first 5-yr strategic plan covered the period from 2002 to 2007. In 2000, the major source of cancer funding came from NCIC, MRC and NHRDP. However, the cancer research landscape has changed since then and funding increased since CIHR was created. Other organizations have shaped the new landscape, such as CRC, Genome Canada, CFI, OCRN, OICR, CCRA, CPAC, TFRI and the integration of NCIC and CCS as well as several cancer runs.

                  Dr. Lussier mentioned that, in order to define the strategic orientations of ICR, it is important that it is aligned with the CIHR Mandate (Blueprint II), the CIHR Strategic Plan, the Federal science and technology strategy, the national cancer research strategies including the CCRA pan-Canadian cancer research strategy and the economic downturn as it is unlikely that the ISI budget of ICR increases. The contents of the strategic plan include a description of the cancer research environment, the mission, vision and values, as well as the strategic orientations and main objectives.

                  Our next step is to draft the 2nd strategic plan for discussion among staff members who will then circulate it to the IAB members for input and comments prior to next IAB meeting. We should also use the CCRA pan-Canadian cancer research strategy Town Hall meetings to get more feedback from cancer research stakeholders and review other CIHR Institutes plans available on the website. The final approval of the strategic plan will take place at the fall 2009 IAB meeting.

                  Action item: Dr. Lussier will circulate a draft of the strategic plan by the end of February and will organize a teleconference in March to consolidate all comments. The 2nd draft will then be forwarded for final approval.

                  ICR Potential Priorities – Decisions

                  Members discussed some current and new priorities for funding opportunities in December 2009. Assuming $250K will be granted to Cancer Stem Cells (instead of $500K as planned) at the end of the year, there will be about 430,000$ available in year 2009-10 and still $2.6M for 2010-11. It was reminded to all that final funding decisions must be made in May to launch initiatives in December.

                  Original priorities

                  • PEOL: KT (up to $100K for the NET teams – 4 @ $25K). By the month of May we will know if we have an interest for a consortium.
                  • Risk Behaviour: On March 31, the existing MOU with CTCRI will end. At this point, we do not know if CTCRI will continue under the existing structure or whether the April 1 competition will take place. There is a CTCRI board meeting on Feb. 12th and Drs. Peter Scholefield and Remi Quirion will be making decisions. ICR will wait for the outcomes of this meeting. It currently is funding a competition on IDEA grants. It was noted that CPACC has allocated about $4M for the Coalitions Linking Actions and Science for Prevention (CLASP) initiative (check website). ICR currently has $500K allocated for CTCRI in 2009-10 and is proposing to use it for the April 1st competition. However probably less than half that amount will be used.
                  • CTRNet: An evaluation report and renewal procedure is underway.

                  New priorities

                  1. Computational Medicine/Systems Biology: ICR supported 3 related STIHR grants.
                  2. Paediatric & Young Adult Cancer: ICR will need to determine the possible amount of funding in this area.
                  3. Survivorship: Coordinate a partnership through CCRA
                  4. Inflammation, immunity, cancer and chronic disease: SDs should convene and discuss a Canadian conference amongst Institutes.

                  Action item: Morag will bring the issue at the next SD meeting.

                  Translation research or cancer imaging could be a 5th priority for ICR. Dr. Eisenhauer will meet with Dr. Bénard for CTG matters and will keep the IAB informed about developments.

                  It was concluded that working groups are essential to move these priorities forward. A few have been identified with an IAB Champion that will be responsible for recruiting young innovative researchers in his/her working group. Other priorities are pending or do not necessitate a working group.

                  1. Computational Medicine (IAB Champion: Jacques Corbeil)
                  2. Paediatric (IAB Champion: R. Barr)
                  3. Survivorship (IAB Champion: E. Eisenhauer). There will be discussions with CCRA after the March 9th meeting. There is no need for a working group at the moment.
                  4. Inflammation, immunity, cancer and chronic disease. Dr. Park will discuss this priority with other SDs before ICR makes any decisions.

                  Ethics

                  Dr. Mes-Masson informed board members that inequities in access to care have been identified as an important issue by the CIHR Standing Committee on Ethics and the Institute Advisory Board Ethics Designates (IABED). For this matter, a joint strategic funding opportunity will be setup to facilitate the implementation of moving from theories to practice. This will be a single joint competition with each partner contributing an amount of $50K per year for 3-5 years. This funding opportunity will be presented to the SDs by March so that it can be launched in December 2009. However, each individual Institute has to agree to put $50K per year in this initiative and Dr. Mes-Masson strongly recommends the participation of ICR to show its commitment in ethics.

                  Decision: Advisory Board members were all in favour to participate in the joint strategic funding opportunity in ethics for the amount of $50K.

                  Others:

                  • CIHR is seeking the participation of the federal government and international funders into a strategic opportunity that will address inequities in society, in addition to ethics.
                  • There is currently a cross-institute initiative led by IGH in collaboration with the CIHR Ethics office.
                  • The Tri-Council Policy Statement on human participation to research has been reviewed and republished in December 2008 for comments. Many changes have occurred from the original document. IABEDs were invited to submit their comments and the ones of their community via teleconference this month and a final version will be voted in June.
                  • Chapters of interest from the Tri-Council Policy Statement include multi-centre clinical trials (chapter 8), bio-banks (chapter 12 and 13) and aboriginal people issues (chapter 11) which is a chapter that has been completed revised. Stem cell oversight committee is also referred to in the document.

                  Report from NCIC/CCS

                  Michael Wosnick indicated that the formal integration of NCIC into CCS has taken place on February 1, 2009 with NCIC now called the CCS Research Institute. All staff members of the research program have kept their positions and the NCIC website content has been transformed and integrated to the CCS web site. Dr. Stuart Edmonds, who was the NCIC Director of Research Programs, has now joined CPACC so there is a recruitment process underway to replace him.

                  Dr. Wosnick presented the October 15, 2008 operating grants competition: 452 applications were received (which represents a decrease of about 10% from last year). NCIC had added a new grant panel on cancer genetics and genomics. There are 15 standing grant panels at the moment. All applications are now done electronically and submitted on CD to eliminate paper.

                  Major national programs include: 1) The NCIC Clinical Trial Groups (CTG), which will keep its name under CCS; 2) The Centre for Behavioural Research and Program Evaluation (CBRPE); 3) A new strategic plan; and 4) The identification of 3 priority areas. The CCS National Prevention Advisory Committee, chaired by Carolyn Gotay, will meet for the first time on February 12. Survivorship is one of the priorities of the leadership fund but CCSRI is still considering its directions in alignment with other partners. Studentships are down 50% from the number of applications submitted in the February 1st competition.

                  Others:

                  • CPCRI dissolved as a separate entity and brought in house.
                  • CTCRI will be dissolved in its current form; tobacco control research agendas of CIHR (ICR and INMHA) and CCS will be pursued separately; but partnerships might continue on a case by case basis.
                  • CBCRA is continuing. CCS is drafting a new Partnership agreement on behalf of the partners.
                  • TFF has decided that all new applications to their project team grant programs will be managed by CIHR after this year's competition.
                  • The economic downturn is affecting donations so CCS will not have the same level of funding for research.
                  • CCS is currently recruiting a new CEO as Barbara Whylie is retiring in the summer.

                  Update on CPACC/CCRA

                  CPAC was funded in 2007 to implement the Canadian Strategy for Cancer Control. Various action groups were created, including the research action group which is mainly composed of CCRA members. Two main projects initiated by CCRA were carried out: 1) the cohort study ($100M, of which $42 comes from CPAC) that plans to recruit 300,000 Canadians; a Governance Council is already in place 2) the Translational research ($20M, of which $10M comes from CPAC) that involves a partnership with TFRI on biomarker projects, a lung cancer early detection project and others in breast, ovary, etc. CCRA has published a survey of cancer research funding in Canada, which is available on website, based on the Common Scientific Outline (CSO). CSO divides funding in multiple categories and survey results show that the bulk of funding is invested in biology and treatment and the lowest funding is in prevention and scientific models. Each member agency had statistics for their own jurisdiction. A subcommittee was set up to work on a pan-Canadian Strategy and there is currently a national consultation process in 5 regions, the 2nd of a 5-step program managed by an external consultant.

                  Other Business

                  Cheryl Robertson indicated that each Institute has one or more lay representatives in its Board with no research background. Under the leadership of Catherine Moore, the CIHR Partnership and Citizens Engagement branch had decided to gather this group to see how they could contribute to Institutes and what is expected of each IAB lay member. The first meeting took place last February after an absence of 4 years and most of the Institutes had representatives. Best practices were shared and Mrs. Robertson recommended at that meeting a face-to-face meeting for workshop reviewers and the improvement of the orientation package for new IAB members, especially lay members. She will distribute the minutes of the past meeting to this advisory board.

                  Nomination of a New Subcommittee for Reviewing Workshop Applications (MPD Program)

                  Dr. Lussier indicated that until last year ICR monitored its own workshop funding program with a budget of about $250K and three competitions per year with a teleconference for reviewers to discuss applications. However, Treasury Board disapproves of these workshop grants being drawn from the Institute Support Grant. CIHR therefore created the Meetings, Planning and Dissemination (MPD) program where a yearly fixed amount from ISG was withheld from each Institute and the program is managed centrally. ICR was involved in the initial CIHR pilot MPD which now requires a face-to-face review process and a relevancy check from each Institute. ICR, III and INMD are piloting this process, so each Institute will examine the relevancy of the applications from its reviewers. Funding recommendations will be made by CIHR peer review committee. The current ICR panel review was composed of Cheryl Robertson, Angela Brooks-Wilson and Richard Doll who evaluated between 6 and 15 applications per competition in the past three years. It is now time to reappoint new reviewers.

                  The following IAB members were nominated for the new MPD review committee:

                  • Steve Pillipow
                  • Scott Leatherdale
                  • Anne Marie Mes-Masson

                  Dr. Lussier noted that the next relevancy review is due on February 17th. The number of applications increased substantially this year, probably due to the visibility on the web site.

                  The board commented on the questions of the evaluation report that was handed out to them. It was mentioned that questions should evolve around the impact of funding this initiative to determine its value-added. Other questions should be asked about CTRNet's new initiatives and future directions. This question report will be sent out shortly to CTRNet and they will have 3 months to respond. The review process will take about 6 weeks, which brings us to the end of June 2009. The review will be done by an ad hoc committee with new reviewers and international members. Dale Dempsey will circulate the composition of panel members for suggestions. During the summer, CTRNet will be advised whether they will be eligible for renewal and if so, they will be asked to reapply in December. Dr. Bryant suggests an email to the IAB members indicating the timeframe for the CTRNet review process for final decision. Members were also concerned about the necessity to carry on a site visit.

                  The meeting on Day 2 was adjourned at 12:30 p.m.

                  Prepared by Diana Sarai