Several Niagara Institute for Health Knowledge researchers were invited to a prestigious European medical conference to share their research findings
The Niagara Health Knowledge Institute (NHKI) is known far beyond Niagara’s borders.
NHKI researchers and staff were invited to share their expertise and research results at a recent prestigious international medical conference that included the World Health Organization as an organizer.
Last month, Dr. Jennifer Tsang, NHKI Executive Director and Principal Investigator, attended the Global Coordination, Coalition and Support Conference for Platform Trials in Dublin, Ireland, and shared her experience and knowledge of building community hospital research capacity in Canada. talked about how it was obtained. It could be applied to build research capacity in low- and middle-income countries ahead of the next global public health emergency.
Organizers of the Dublin conference included the World Health Organization, the Irish Critical Care Network, the International Severe Acute Respiratory and Emerging Infectious Diseases Consortium, and the International Forum of Emergency Medicine Trialists (InFACT).
Unlike traditional clinical trials, which study interventions for specific diseases, platform trials are open-ended studies that can continue indefinitely, with new interventions added or removed over time.
“The ultimate goal is to share knowledge and resources, develop the infrastructure to study emerging health emergencies, and empower low- and middle-income countries to not only participate in research, but to lead it. “That’s what we do,” Dr. Tsang says. funded her attendance at the Dublin Conference.
“For example, how do countries study Mpox if they don’t have the infrastructure to do so?” she added. “Patients in Africa are likely to be very different from patients in the United States, and linking platform trials is one way to make clinical trials accessible to everyone. It’s the same reason, it’s about building equity in health care, and that’s part of NHKI’s mission.”
While attending the World Congress, Dr. Tsang participated in discussions about the Community ICU Research Toolkit, an open-access guide for building and maintaining clinical research programs in community hospitals for use in Pakistan. did. Dr. Tsang led the development of the toolkit with Dr. Alexandra Binney, a critical care physician at William Osler Health System in Toronto.
Research learning modules developed by NHKI will also be shared for use in South Asian countries.
“We are committed to sharing our expertise for the greater good,” says Dr. Tsang. “Our team has put a lot of time and effort into this module. Would you like to share it?”
I’m going to NHK Spain
Five NHKI researchers and trainees were also invited to present their research at the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine (ESICM) general meeting held in Barcelona, Spain last week.
Vanessa Joffe, a 2023 NHKI undergraduate summer student, gave a poster presentation about her innovative blood biomarker research that will be published in the PLOS ONE journal. Gyolfi’s findings, which show that plasma biomarkers can remain stable for up to 72 hours at room temperature, pave the way for more community and remote hospitals to participate in health research, regardless of where in the world they are located. .
Prey Patel presented a poster on findings from volunteer work with Dr. Tsang and NHKI on a scoping review of research activities at community hospitals in Ontario. Patel, a Welland resident and first-year medical student at Queen’s University, wrote an honors thesis on this topic as a health sciences student at McMaster University. This study has been accepted for publication in BioMed Central Health Services Research.
NHKI Research Manager Elaina Orlando presented on her Postdoctoral Fellowship research, which is essentially a descriptive case study of a community hospital research program, and Research Coordinator Kian Rego presented two posters. One concerns the influencing factors of community hospitals’ participation in research programs. The other study compared pneumonia patients treated at a community hospital with patients at a university hospital. Both studies have been accepted for publication in the Canadian Journal of Anesthesia and BioMed Central Pneumonia, respectively.
Heather O’Grady, a postdoctoral fellow at NHKI, was invited by ESICM to present her findings at a plenary session on the latest systematic reviews and meta-analyses of leg cycle ergometry in critically ill patients. Her research was published the same day in the New England Journal of Medicine Evidence. Dr. Rucha Utgikar, an intensive care physician at Niagara Health, is a co-author of the study.
Presenters’ attendance at the conference was self-funded, including holiday travel, supported by grants allocated for conference attendance, or paid by ESICM.
“It is very remarkable that five posters and a plenary were presented at the same conference, and that Niagara Health has produced this much in the 16 months since the Knowledge Institute was established. The gains in sex are also very impressive,” says Dr. Tsang. “This shows the passion of the people who work overtime and with their own money to achieve this career goal, and I am proud of NHKI’s role in developing the next generation of health researchers. ”
