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Gathering More Evidence

Future Research Initiatives Related to Supporting a High-Quality, Accessible and Sustainable Health Care System

Helping support a high-quality, accessible and sustainable health care system is an important priority for CIHR. To better focus investments, the organization has recently launched a number of major research initiatives to increase research activity in this area. Known as CIHR Roadmap Signature Initiatives,¹ these new investments will help CIHR allocate its resources to make the strongest possible impact on health and health care – today, tomorrow and well into the future.

Roadmap Signature Initiative – Community-Based Primary Health Care

This initiative covers the broad range of primary prevention and primary care services within the community (including public health, health promotion and disease prevention); the diagnosis, treatment, and management of chronic and episodic illnesses; rehabilitation support; and end-of-life care. Community-based primary health care involves the coordination and provision of integrated care provided by a range of health providers, including nurses, social workers, pharmacists, dieticians, public health practitioners, physicians and others in a range of community settings including people’s homes, health care clinics, physicians’ offices, public health units, hospices and workplaces. It is delivered in a way that is patient- and population-centred and responsive to economic, social, cultural and gender differences.

Roadmap Signature Initiative – Evidence-Informed Health Care Renewal

The Evidence-Informed Health Care Renewal initiative will support researchers and decision makers to work together to advance the current state of knowledge, generate novel and creative solutions, and translate evidence for uptake into policy and practice to strengthen Canada’s health care systems.

Roadmap Signature Initiative – Pathways to Health Equity for Aboriginal Peoples

Through the Pathways to Health Equity for Aboriginal Peoples signature initiative, CIHR will fund research to find out how we can bring together Western scientific knowledge and the traditional knowledge of First Nations, Inuit and Metis peoples to identify health interventions that work. The initiative aims to find ways to adapt existing health research to the diverse needs of Aboriginal communities, where values, traditional knowledge and history vary greatly.

1. The name Roadmap Signature Initiatives is linked to CIHR's five-year strategic plan, Health Research Roadmap: Creating innovative research for better health and health care.