“Childhood-onset mental health problems impose very high burdens to children, families, schools and broader social and health systems.  The social determinants of health are arguably the most powerful influences on child and adult mental health.  However, few public or clinical mental health interventions systematically assess the social determinants of health and mechanisms that lead to adverse child and youth outcomes.  With support from the PSI Mental Health Knowledge Translation Fellowship, I will be able to continue my work to implement and evaluate the “Family Check-Up,” a family-centered, evidence-based program that targets known risk and protective factors for child well-being.  I will disseminate findings from our projects evaluating the Family Check-Up in three particularly high-needs populations:  children aged 2-4 years old with early onset emotional and behavioural problems, children and youth with autism spectrum disorder, and child and youth mental health outpatients.  We will disseminate our results with an aim to “make the race fair” for children and youth at high risk of severe and chronic mental health problems.” – Dr. Teresa Bennett

Dr. Teresa Bennett’s Current Appointments:

• Associate Professor, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Neurosciences, McMaster University
• Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist, Child and Youth Mental Health Program, Hamilton Health Sciences

Dr. Teresa Bennett’s Research:

• Dr. Bennett’s current research program focuses on the implementation and evaluation of the Family Check-Up (FCU) as a targeted prevention and intervention program. The FCU is a brief, evidence-based intervention that has demonstrated robust and sustained effects across child and family mental health outcomes in US studies. It is unique in its focus on multimodal assessment, tailored intervention, and emphasis on family engagement within a motivational interviewing framework.  Her research program is the first to evaluate the FCU within a Canadian setting, and comprises independent studies of its effects in 3 different samples of Ontario children at risk of chronic and severe mental illness:
  1. As a targeted prevention program for very young children (2-4 years old) at high risk of severe and chronic emotional and behaviour problems;
  2. As an ecological preventive and clinical intervention for families of children with autism spectrum disorder and comorbid emotional and behaviour problems;
  3. As a clinical intervention within a tertiary child mental health outpatient setting

About the PSI Mental Health Knowledge Translation Fellowship

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time Fellowship provides up to $300,000 in funding over two or three years for a clinician-researcher within 10 years of their first academic appointment. This Fellowship is intended to provide salary support for an Ontario investigator, who has demonstrated the ability to successfully complete high impact knowledge translation research in the area of mental health.

“Stigma disproportionately impacts vulnerable and marginalized groups within healthcare, often resulting in inequitable outcomes. This award will allow our team to explore invisible and structural forms of mental illness stigma that are often embedded within organizational policies and practices. As we begin to deconstruct stigma through our research, we also aim to co-construct a new model of digital stigma reduction. By leveraging technology, and democratizing expertise, we hope to bring patients, caregivers, and health professionals together to tackle stigmatizing practices, and improve care for patients with mental illness.” – Dr. Javeed Sukhera

Dr. Javeed Sukhera’s Current Appointments:

• Associate Professor, Department of Psychiatry, Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry, Western University
• Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist, London Health Sciences Centre
• Scientist, Centre for Education Research and Innovation Western University
• Associate Scientist, Lawson Health Research Institute/Children’s Health Research Institute

Dr. Javeed Sukhera’s Research:

• Dr. Sukhera’s current interdisciplinary research program explores how stigma and bias influence patient care for marginalized and vulnerable populations, as well as how educational and policy innovations can improve health equity.
• He also has an interest in participatory approaches to knowledge translation and knowledge mobilization through co-design with patients and their caregivers.

About the PSI Mental Health Knowledge Translation Fellowship

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time Fellowship provides up to $300,000 in funding over two or three years for a clinician-researcher within 10 years of their first academic appointment. This Fellowship is intended to provide salary support for an Ontario investigator, who has demonstrated the ability to successfully complete high impact knowledge translation research in the area of mental health.

“Improving the emergency care of patients and easing the suffering of as many as individuals as possible are the ultimate goals in my research career. It is an honor to be recognized by the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research award. PSI was there at the beginning when it funded our derivation study and now with this award is helping me implement the risk-stratification tool.  This award will enable me to advance emergency syncope care in Ontario, nationally and internationally by evaluating the effectiveness of the practice recommendations developed based on our Canadian Syncope Risk Score.” – Dr. Venkatesh Thiruganasambandamoorthy

Dr. Venkatesh Thiruganasambandamoorthy’s Current Appointments:

• Associate Professor, Departments of Emergency and Epidemiology, University of Ottawa
• Staff Attending Physician, The Ottawa Hospital
• Senior Scientist, The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute

Dr. Venkatesh Thiruganasambandamoorthy’s Research:

• Dr. Thiruganasambandamoorthy’s research program focuses on health systems, specifically Emergency Department (ED) health care resource utilization and risk-stratification. His research focus is on the optimal management of the ED patients with syncope.

About the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research Award

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time award provides up to $300,000 in funding over three or four years for a clinician-researcher between five and 15 years of their first academic appointment. This award recognizes that this phase of a researcher’s career is particularly challenging, with additional academic roles and responsibilities as well as the ongoing clinical work, and it will protect at least 50% of a recipient’s time for research that aligns with PSI Foundation priorities.

“Postoperative delirium is associated with increased mortality, long-term cognitive decline, loss of autonomy, and costs. Moreover, the literature shows that, among the public, concerns about postoperative “brain damage” and “memory loss” are more frequent than concerns about death due to surgery. Indeed, the shift towards surgery in the elderly with multiple medical comorbidities will increase the encounter with surgical patients that will likely value the impact of our care on their cognitive and physical abilities, more than a prolonged survival. My research has a great potential of reducing the impact of surgery on patient lives as well as on resource use.” – Dr. Maura Marcucci

Dr. Maura Marcucci’s Current Appointments:

• Assistant Professor, Department of Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact & Department of Medicine, McMaster University
• Staff Physician, Division of General Internal Medicine & Division of Perioperative Care, Hamilton Health Science and St Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton (McMaster University)
• Research Director, Division of General Internal Medicine, McMaster University
• Investigator, Population Health Research Institute, Hamilton, Ontario

Dr. Maura Marcucci’s Research:

• Dr. Marucucci’s current research program focuses on neurocognitive outcomes of noncardiac surgery (i.e., postoperative delirium and long-term cognitive decline) with a specific focus on underlying mechanisms and risk factors, and interventions to reduce their incidence. She is currently leading the cogPOISE-3 study, a substudy of a large international trial looking at the effect of minimizing perioperative blood loss and hypotension, on the incidence of in-hospital delirium and 1-year cognitive decline after noncardiac surgery. She is also conducting systematic reviews of the literature on vascular and non-vascular risk factors of postoperative delirium and cognitive decline, including the role of perioperative pain and pain management, with a focus on opioids
• She is also working on improving the feasibility and methodological quality of my research, and, at the same time, increase its innovation, including the development of Artificial Intelligence models for the interpretation of neuropsychological tests

About the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research Award

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time award provides up to $300,000 in funding over three or four years for a clinician-researcher between five and 15 years of their first academic appointment. This award recognizes that this phase of a researcher’s career is particularly challenging, with additional academic roles and responsibilities as well as the ongoing clinical work, and it will protect at least 50% of a recipient’s time for research that aligns with PSI Foundation priorities.

“This award will focus on three research projects that will fundamentally change how women with obesity are cared for during pregnancy. Every patient deserves the right to individualized, evidence-based care, with special attention to those from vulnerable populations. Taken as a whole, women with marked obesity clearly face higher risks of adverse pregnancy outcomes, yet some women with obesity have very successful pregnancies and births. Using novel methodology (patient preference trial design, bundled care, etc.), this research aims to provide both patients and maternity care providers with personalized information about the best maternity care in the best place at the best time.” – Dr. Laura Gaudet

Dr. Laura Gaudet’s Current Appointments:

• Associate Professor of OB/GYN and Radiology, Department of Medicine, Queen’s University
• Clinician Scientist, Kingston Health Sciences Centre
• Adjunct Scientist, Ottawa Health Research Institute
• Adjunct Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health, University of Ottawa

Dr. Laura Gaudet’s Research:

• Dr. Gaudet’s current research program focuses on advancing evidence around pragmatic clinical care of pregnancies complicated by obesity
• This research grant will support three projects:
  1. The completion of a pilot patient preference clinical trial of mode of delivery for primiparous women who have severe obesity (BMI ≥40 kg/m²)
  2. The development and evaluation of a triage tool to direct care of women with obesity to low-risk versus high-risk maternity care models
  3. A prospective pre- and post-intervention study of a bundle of care for prevention of wound infection among women with obesity who undergo Cesarean section delivery

About the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research Award

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time award provides up to $300,000 in funding over three or four years for a clinician-researcher between five and 15 years of their first academic appointment. This award recognizes that this phase of a researcher’s career is particularly challenging, with additional academic roles and responsibilities as well as the ongoing clinical work, and it will protect at least 50% of a recipient’s time for research that aligns with PSI Foundation priorities.

“The PSI Mid-Career Clinician Researcher award will enable me to expand our research program aimed at identifying treatments for many of the currently untreatable cognitive and behavioural symptoms of dementias. Our current clinical trial, FOXY,  is examining the potential for the hormone oxytocin to augment empathy deficits and apathy in patients with Frontotemporal Dementia. With the PSI award, we will further examine and optimize the clinical trial metrics and tools to enable efficient trial design for other neuropsychiatric symptoms in FTD and other dementias, and expand and intensify our training of the next generation of scientists and clinician-researchers working in the fields of cognitive neuroscience and neurodegenerative disease.” – Dr. Elizabeth Finger

Dr. Elizabeth Finger’s Current Appointments

• Associate Professor, Department of Clinical Neurological Sciences, Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, Western University
• Neurologist, London Health Sciences Centre and Parkwood Institute, St. Joseph’s Health Care
• Director of Research, Department of Clinical Neurological Sciences
• Scientist, Lawson Health Research Institute
• Scientist, Robarts Research Institute

Dr. Elizabeth Finger’s Research:

• Dr. Finger’s research program focuses on understanding the cognitive, neural, and genetic substrates of abnormal decision-making, emotion, and social behavior. Her research focus is on identifying treatments for the symptoms of apathy and impaired empathy in patients with Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD), to improve their quality of life as well as that of their caregivers and families.

About the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research Award

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time award provides up to $300,000 in funding over three or four years for a clinician-researcher between five and 15 years of their first academic appointment. This award recognizes that this phase of a researcher’s career is particularly challenging, with additional academic roles and responsibilities as well as the ongoing clinical work, and it will protect at least 50% of a recipient’s time for research that aligns with PSI Foundation priorities.

“Living and working in northern Ontario, a region that is under-serviced, has been a privilege; I am grateful for this opportunity to have protected research time to answer under-researched questions. I hope that the answers will improve healthcare to some of Ontario’s most vulnerable populations.” – Dr. Chiachen Cheng

Dr. Chiachen Cheng’s Current Appointments:

• Assistant Professor, Clinical Sciences Division, Section of Psychiatry, Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM)
• Site Director – Psychiatry – Thunder Bay Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM)
• Psychiatry Post-graduate Program Research Coordinator Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM)
• Medical Director Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre: Thunder Bay
• Child & Adolescent, Adult Psychiatrist & Physician Researcher St. Joseph’s Care Group: Thunder Bay

Dr. Chiachen Cheng’s Research:

• Dr. Cheng’s research focus is in health services and policy research, especially as it intersects with vulnerable populations such as Indigenous youth, remote and rural populations, and people with severe mental illness. Central question to her work has been, how can we better deliver accessible, quality and equitable services to youth experiencing severe mental illness, in rural and remote Ontario?
• Each of the proposed projects under this salary support are about enhancing networks for improved healthcare delivery. This award will support research in three ways: 1) to finish the work of the NorthBEAT Collaborative by supporting end-of-grant knowledge translation, especially involving members of the Collaborative who are youth, and who lived-experience access services; 2) to develop MAYNet, a proposal to develop a national strategy for youth-friendly mental health and addiction services; 3) to support the knowledge translation workshops of NORTHH, a proposal to establish a practice-based research network among primary care and community specialists in northern Ontario

About the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research Award

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time award provides up to $300,000 in funding over three or four years for a clinician-researcher between five and 15 years of their first academic appointment. This award recognizes that this phase of a researcher’s career is particularly challenging, with additional academic roles and responsibilities as well as the ongoing clinical work, and it will protect at least 50% of a recipient’s time for research that aligns with PSI Foundation priorities.

“This award marries my passion for critical care research and research methodology. With this award, I propose to enhance the visibility of SGBA in Critical Care and grow the science of ‘sex and gender research’ in acute care’. The results of the included studies are expected to inform policy, inform future study design and reporting, and catalyze secondary analyses of previously published studies. More importantly, this research program will build capacity in SGBA and position Canada as a leader in ‘sex and gender science’ in Critical Care.” – Dr. Karen Burns

Dr. Karen Burns’ Current Appointments:

• Associate Professor and Clinician Scientist, Department of Medicine, University of Toronto
• Staff Physician, Critical Care Medicine, Unity Health Network – St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, Ontario
• Scientist, Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute, Toronto, Ontario
• Part-time faculty, Department of Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact (McMaster University).

Dr. Karen Burns’ Research:

• Dr. Burns’ current research program focuses on advancing the conduct and reporting of sex and gender based analyses (SGBA) in Critical Care.
• Two studies in this research program will highlight under use and under-reporting of SGBA in practice changing research in both acute care and Critical Care research. Two studies will introduce researchers to secondary analyses of Critical Care research. The final study in her proposed research program will demonstrate how to conduct SGBA in a prospective, multicenter, cluster, crossover RCT of alternative resident work schedules

About the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research Award

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time award provides up to $300,000 in funding over three or four years for a clinician-researcher between five and 15 years of their first academic appointment. This award recognizes that this phase of a researcher’s career is particularly challenging, with additional academic roles and responsibilities as well as the ongoing clinical work, and it will protect at least 50% of a recipient’s time for research that aligns with PSI Foundation priorities.

“Most women in Ontario will be adversely affected by one or more uterine conditions at some point, and more than a quarter of Ontarian women will receive a hysterectomy as definitive treatment.  Women affected by menstrual disorders are most often also the main caregivers and income earners within their families, making substantial economic contributions to their communities.  As such, research to improve the treatment of menstrual disorders and hysterectomy surgical practice is of paramount importance, not only to Ontarian women, but also to their families, their communities, as well as the Ontario healthcare system and Canadian society.” – Dr. Innie Chen

Dr. Innie Chen’s Current Appointments:

• Associate Professor and Clinical Research Chair, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, The University of Ottawa
• Cross-Appointment to the School of Epidemiology and Public Health, The University of Ottawa
• Associate Scientist, The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
• Staff Physician, The Ottawa Hospital

Dr. Innie Chen’s Research:

• Dr. Chen’s research program focuses on improving women’s gynecologic health through the use of population-based epidemiological methods. Her research focus is on hysterectomy surgical practice in Canada.

About the PSI-50 Mid-Career Clinical Research Award

In celebration of PSI Foundation’s 50th anniversary, this one-time award provides up to $300,000 in funding over three or four years for a clinician-researcher between five and 15 years of their first academic appointment. This award recognizes that this phase of a researcher’s career is particularly challenging, with additional academic roles and responsibilities as well as the ongoing clinical work, and it will protect at least 50% of a recipient’s time for research that aligns with PSI Foundation priorities.