| CIHR Institutes |
| IHDCYH Home |
| About IHDCYH |
| IHDCYH Funding |
| IHDCYH Publications & Resources |
| Strategic Plan |
| Annual Reports |
| Newsletter |
| Archived News |
| IHDCYH Calendar of Events |
| Contact IHDCYH |
For more information please contact:
CIHR - Institute of Human Development, Child and Youth Health
The Montreal Children's Hospital
Les Tourelles, T - 118
2300 Tupper Street
Montreal, Quebec H3H 1P3
Tel.: (514) 412-4414
Fax: (514) 412-4253
IHDCYH-IDSEA@cihr-irsc.gc.ca
ISBN: 0-9731037-7-9
The last year has witnessed many changes at IHDCYH. In May 2003, John Challis resigned as Scientific Director (SD) to assume his new position as Vice President for Research and Associate Provost at the University of Toronto. As the previous Chair of the Institute's Advisory Board, I was asked to serve as the interim SD, then appointed to the "permanent" post as of last November. The Institute's office was moved from Toronto to the McGill University Health Centre in Montreal and the official opening at The Montreal's Children Hospital will be held in November 2004. IHDCYH was the first of CIHR's Institutes to move and the first to change SDs. Many thanks to Denise Moretto and Jocelyne Arès in the Toronto office, Stella DiPiano in the Montreal office, and Loretta Wong and Amanda Devost at CIHR Corporate in Ottawa for their work both and commitment, before and after the Institute's move to Montreal.
The good news is that IHDCYH has a number of excellent funding initiatives planned over the next few months and years. These include a re-launch of our Healthy Pregnancy RFA in June 2004 and plans for joint RFAs on childhood asthma (with CIHR's Institute of Infection and Immunity) and ethical-legal-social issues in pregnancy and childhood (with the CIHR Ethics Office) in the coming year.
With new staff soon to be hired in Montreal and Ottawa, IHDCYH is poised to play a major role in reproductive and child health research in Canada and beyond.
The Institute of Human Development, Child and Youth Health supports research addressing the causes, prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of conditions associated with reproduction, pregnancy, infancy, childhood, and youth.
In Fall 2002, IHDCYH launched a Request for Applications (RFA) on Healthy Pregnancy for Great Life Beginnings. The purpose of this initiative was to provide support for multi-disciplinary collaborative research on the determinants, mechanisms, and therapies of preterm birth and adverse fetal growth and the impact of these outcomes on the child, family, and community. Only one project was accepted for funding: $3,750,000 over five years was granted to Drs. Stephen Matthews (University of Toronto) and Michael Meaney (McGill University) for their project entitled "Maternal Adversity, Vulnerability, and Neurodevelopment".
In June 2003, the Institute issued an RFA on Healthy Developmental Trajectories of Infants, Children, and Youth. Its objective was to investigate the interplay among biological, psychosocial, environmental, and cultural influences on the development of healthy children and those with chronic physical or mental illness. After review of the submitted letters of intent, 10 applicants were invited to submit a full proposal.
Under its strategic research priority on pre- and post-implantation health, the Institute continued to fund three interdisciplinary grants from our past RFA on Healthy Gametes and Great Embryos, for a total of $1,698,000 in 2003-04. In partnership with other CIHR Institutes, IHDCYH provided $668,541 in 2003-04 to ten New Emerging Teams (NETs) covering many aspects of the Institute's mandate. These NETs focused on fetal alcohol syndrome, prenatal exposure to maternal cigarette smoking, childhood asthma, diabetes, violence, schizophrenia, and childhood inattention.
IHDCYH is committed to building capacity through effective training programs encompassing all all areas of health research, including biomedical, clinical, health services and population health research. Over the past year, the Institute has focused on support for young investigators.
IHDCYH provided six start-up grants for young investigators through CIHR's Priority Announcements, for a total of $421,196 in 2003-04. These young investigators are affiliated with IHDCYH and were highly rated in the March or September 2003 CIHR open grants competition, but were just below the threshold for funding (see table below).
| Principal Applicant | Grant title |
|---|---|
| Jean-François Bilodeau CHUL - Université Laval |
Glutathione peroxidases (GPx) in preeclampsia: Potential biochemical markers and impact on vasoconstrictive prostanoids production |
| Victoria M. Allen Dalhousie University |
Perinatal outcomes in pregnancies complicated by inflammatory bowel disease |
| Principal Applicant | Grant title |
|---|---|
| Anick Bérard Hôpital Sainte-Justine (Montreal) |
Inappropriate management of women on isotretinoin therapy and its effect on pregnancy and congenital malformation outcomes, and health care cost |
| Robert F. Bertolo Memorial University of Newfoundland |
Sulfur amino acid metabolism and compensatory growth |
| Johanne Renaud Hôpital Sainte-Justine (Montreal) |
Comparative trajectories of utilisation of services and unmet needs: Suicide, suicide attempts and community controls |
| Hugo Théorêt Université de Montréal |
Visual-auditory interactions in the brain of normal and sensory-deprived human subjects |
The New Investigator Grant Program is a collaboration with the Hospital for Sick Children Foundation (HSCF, Toronto) that funds new investigators to carry out research projects related to child health. In 2003-04, IHDCYH and HSCF co-funded 18 such projects across Canada, for a total IHDCYH contribution of $500,000 over two years (see Table below). The Institute also provided ongoing funds ($1,108,081 in 2003-04) to 11 Strategic Training Initiatives in Health Research.
| Principal Applicant | Grant Title |
|---|---|
| Ali A. Ashkar McMaster university |
Induction of innate immunity against genital HSV-2 infection via TLR3 signaling |
| Volker Blank Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research (Montreal) |
Regulation of MafF by cytokines in uterus and placenta |
| Janet Brunton Memorial University of Newfoundland |
The roles of arginine, nitric oxide and blood flow in small intestinal adaptation in the neonatal piglet |
| Farida Cheriet Hôpital Sainte-Justine (Montreal) |
Reliability study of non-invasive assessment of the 3-D trunk asymmetry in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis |
| Carolyn Emery University of Calgary |
A prevention strategy to reduce the incidence of injury in high school sport: A cluster randomized clinical trial |
| Walid Farhat Hospital for Sick Children (Toronto) |
The search for an optimal bladder substitute |
| Bernhard Ganss University of Toronto |
The role of the zinc finger transcription factor Krox-26 in developmental defects of tooth and enamel formation |
| Sharun Gibbins Sunnybrook & Women's College Health Sciences Centre |
Pain behaviours in extremely low birth weight infants |
| Donna Goodwin University of Saskatchewan |
Illness to wellness: Building health capacity for youth with spinal cord injuries |
| Abdelilah Soussi Gounni University of Manitoba |
High affinity receptor of IgE (FceRI) in airway smooth muscle cells |
| Vincent Joseph Centre hospitalier universitaire du Québec |
Perinatal steroids are necessary for the normal development of the respiratory controller network |
| Donald J. Mabbott The Hospital for Sick Children (Toronto) |
Neuroimaging and cognitive function in children with brain tumors |
| Bruce Mazer McGill University |
Understanding respiratory and mucosal allergy using an ex vivo lymph node model |
| Marc Moreau University of Alberta |
Improving the effectiveness of brace treatment for adolescent scoliosis |
| Anne Monique Nuyt Hôpital Sainte-Justine (Montreal) |
Role of oxidative stress in utero programming of hypertension |
| Stephen Ryan Bloorview MacMillan Centre (Toronto) |
Effect of postural control devices for preschoolers on child performance, family functioning and caregiver assistance |
| John B. Vincent Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (Toronto) |
Epigenetic approaches to identifying autism susceptibility genes |
| Wendy Ward University of Toronto |
Bone mass and growth following necrotizing entercolitis |
One of IHDCYH's objectives is to promulgate and translate research findings into public policy, health care services, and health products that result in better lifelong health. Through its 2003-04 workshop program, IHDCYH funded 20 multidisciplinary workshops related to IHDCYH's research priorities, for a total of $130,934. Funded workshops included:
In 2003-04, IHDCYH continued to enhance linkages and partnerships in research planning and funding with other CIHR Institutes, national organizations, and its U.S. counterpart, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD).
IHDCYH partnered with the Institute of Gender and Health on Health Disparities; the Institute of Population and Public Health on Global Health Research; the Institute of Nutrition, Metabolism and Diabetes on Childhood Obesity; and the Institute of Neuroscience, Mental Health and Addiction (INMHA) on Gene Therapy for Neurological Diseases.
IHDCYH strongly supports research in environmental influences on health and has championed the Health and Environment cross-cutting strategic initiative. In 2003-04, the Institute actively developed partnerships with the National Research Council (NRC), the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC), Health Canada, and Environment Canada for the initial planning and development of a future RFA on Childhood Asthma and Indoor Air Quality.
IHDCYH also partnered with INMHA and the Canadian Tobacco Control Research Initiative on tobacco control and nicotine addiction.
In collaboration with INMHA and the Institute of Aging, IHDCYH implemented a new collaborative small grants program with JSPS, the Japanese Society for Promotion of Science. Although no IHDCYH grants were awarded in this program in 2003-04, the program has been re-announced for 2004-05.
IHDCYH initiated planning for joint IHDCYH-NICHD summer courses in reproductive and perinatal epidemiology and in maternal-fetal pharmacology. The objective of the courses is to provide Canadian and U.S. health research trainees with a methodological and substantive basis for pursuing independent investigation in these areas, for which courses are either unavailable or insufficient in both countries.
In partnership with CIHR's Institute of Genetics and Institute of Population and Public Health, IHDCYH has been actively involved in planning the CNBC, which plans to investigate genetic and environmental determinants of selected health and disease outcomes in children and youth. The outcomes of major interest include adverse pregnancy outcomes, asthma, obesity, and attention deficit and conduct disorders. A second design workshop involving national and international experts was held in Toronto in March 2004.
Michael Kramer has been the Scientific Director of IHDCYH since May 2003. During this past year, IHDCYH's office was successfully transferred from Toronto to the McGill University Health Centre in Montreal, with new staff to be recruited in Montreal and Ottawa early in 2004-05.
The Institute Advisory Board (IAB) is composed of 16 members from the scientific community, voluntary sector, health care system, and governmental agencies. Lynn Krepart served as interim Chair for most of 2003-04, following Michael Kramer's nomination as Scientific Director. The IAB played a crucial role in supporting and advising the Institute's Directorate during its transition period.
For the year ended March 31, 2004
| Available Funds
|
|
$1,000,029
|
| Expenses | ||
| Institute Development | ||
| Conference, symposia and workshops | $173,825 | |
| Institute Advisory Board | 57,690 | |
| Professional services | 38,765 | |
| Travel Expenditures | 36,012
|
$306,293 |
| Institute Operations | ||
| Salaries and benefits | $479,399 | |
| Office accomodations | 28,521 | |
| Telephone and communication services | 5,422 | |
| Supplies, material and other services | 48,621 | |
| Office furniture and fixtures | - | |
| Computer equipment and IT support | 15,049 | |
| Professional services | 73,133 | |
| Travel expenditures | 76,443 | |
| Other expenditures | 861
|
$727,449 |
| Total Expenses
|
|
$1,033,741
|
| Unspent Balance* | ($33 711) |
For the year ended March 31, 2004
| Strategic Initiatives | Number | Contributions through Grants and Awards ($) | ||||
| 2003-04 | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | 2006 and beyond |
Total | ||
| Healthy Pregnancy | 1 | 519,100 | 730,900 | 750,000 | 1,750,000 | 3,750,000 |
| Reduce Health Disparities | 5 | 204,683 | - | - | - | 204,683 |
| Global Health Research | 3 | 119,480 | - | - | - | 119,480 |
| Obesity & Healthy Body Weight | 3 | 89,999 | - | - | - | 89,999 |
| Healthy Gametes & Great Embryos | 3 | 1,698,290 | 1,698,290 | 1,698,290 | 2,972,009 | 8,066,879 |
| Operating Grants | 10 | 600,344 | - | - | - | 600,344 |
| New Emerging Teams | 10 | 668,541 | 668,140 | 668,141 | 636,122 | 2,640,944 |
| Gene Therapy-Neuro Diseases | 1 | 50,000 | - | - | - | 50,000 |
| CIHR Training Program Grants | 7 | 1,108,081 | 1,143,508 | 1,180,175 | 2,592,963 | 6,024,727 |
| Healthy Dev. Trajectories Inf. | 10 | 75,000 | - | - | - | 75,000 |
| Tobacco | 1 | 61,150 | - | - | - | 61,150 |
| Env. Approaches Phys. Activity | 2 | 110,000 | - | - | - | 110,000 |
| 56 | 5,304,668 | 4,240,838 | 4,296,606 | 7,951,094 | 21,793,206 | |
Note: Grants and awards in respect to these programs are approved for 1 to 6 years. Figures displayed represent CIHR financial commitments for these programs in 2003-04 and subsequent years. Availability of these funds in future years are subject to funding appropriations by Parliament. For some initiatives, partners also contributed to the funding of the grants and awards.
