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Message 1 Providence Research Monthly Newsletter June 2025
2 Summer in Australia means swarms of ies, barbecues, swooping kookaburras eager to take advantage of whatever it is you’re grilling, and sunburn. In B.C., my biggest takeaway heralding summer, beyond the dizzying display of blooms, is the sheer number of cyclists that dust of their Lycra, polish their bikes and venture back to the bike paths and roads. On my way in this morning, I counted 16 in a 2-column peloton navigating the bike path, which made me think I have to plan dierent routes. However, this summer is dierent in one major way: excavation of the site for the CSRC is well underway, and the rst signs of construction are now visible on site – turning our vision into reality. It’s truly inspiring to witness this transformation. With support from St. Paul’s Foundation, we have captured this progress in a new construction site video, which will be shared in our July newsletter. We are committed to keeping everyone informed and engaged as we move forward, and hope this helps to share the momentum. We also hope you had a chance to explore the CSRC Interior Design and Virtual Reality Open House earlier this month. Plans for the ocial opening of the Phase 1 Clinical Trials Unit at Mount Saint Joseph Hospital are currently being nalized. This important milestone represents the rst completed element as we broaden our research expansion in the clinical trials sector. We are coordinating with the provincial government to align calendars for both The Hon. Josie Osborne, Minister of Health, and The Hon. Diana Gibson, Minister of Jobs, Economic Development and Innovation, to join us at the formal opening ceremony this summer. Their participation highlights the signicance of this facility for both healthcare advancement and economic development in our region. Further details about the event will be shared as they are conrmed. For more information about the CTU at MSJH, please visit our website, where you can nd a detailed CTU brochure and an Overview for Investigators document. Additionally, St. Paul’s Foundation has created an excellent video highlighting the unit. To schedule a visit or ask questions, please contact our Research Operations Manager, Lena Legkaia, at P1CTU@providencehealth.bc.ca. Also, this month we completed the –Annual Report, which was presented to the Providence Health Care Board of Directors — and the feedback was extremely positive! They are truly impressed by the amazing work happening across our research community. It's a great reminder of the support and commitment that surrounds us at Providence. Before I sign o this month, I would like to congratulate Dr. Bradley Quon, the recipient of the 2025 Research and Mission Award for his world-renowned clinical work in the treatment of cystic brosis (CF). The award recognizes his internationally renowned research evaluating biomarkers of inammation to inform precision medicine in CF. He has one of the largest CF blood biorepositories in the world, with over 5000 longitudinal samples collected from 600 unique participants across 12 CF centres in North America. This unique resource has been used to identify novel biomarkers to predict, diagnose, and phenotype CF pulmonary exacerbations. Dr. Quon is another impressive example of the medical researchers we have at Providence, and the global impact they have on patient outcomes. Until next month, the beat goes on, Darryl Dr. Darryl Knight, June 26, 2025
3 New commentary in the Canadian Journal of Public Health Angela Russolillo, director of mental health clinical research, authored a commentary published on June 9 in the Canadian Journal of Public Health’s Special Section on the Public Health Response to the Toxic Drug Crisis in Canada: “A call for upstream solutions to the unregulated drug crisis in British Columbia, Canada: Locked up or locked out.” She writes, “Relying on involuntary treatment as a primary response to this public health issue raises several ethical and clinical concerns. With the majority of evidence on involuntary treatment demonstrating limited eectiveness, and potential for increased harms, alternative evidence-based approaches are urgently needed. Addressing this public health challenge requires a shift away from involuntary treatment to person-centered, voluntary, integrated, and community-based solutions that address the social determinants of health.” New publication on the prevalence of mental disorders among people in BC with opioid use disorder Angela Russolillo, Fahmida Homayra, and Bohdan Nosyk published “Prevalence and temporal trends of mental disorders in persons with opioid use disorder and concurrent mental disorders in British Columbia, Canada, using population-level administrative data, 2013 to 2021” in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry. The publication reports on a population-based retrospective observational study using individual-level linked health administrative data. The authors write, “Our ndings demonstrate a steadily growing prevalence of people with OUD and a concurrent mental disorder and emphasize the need for access to mental disorder treatment among this population. Estimating specic mental disorder prevalence is a pragmatic step toward informing clinical guidelines, service needs, and health system planning.” Advancing Health Outcomes Work in Progress seminar Angela Russolillo and Michelle Carter presented two projects that used a modied e-Delphi approach to identify critical elements of integrated care—one project on perinatal mental health and the other on concurrent disorders. Both studies converged on these key ndings: “1) the importance of incorporating lived/living experience alongside health professionals in system redesign; 2) the need for structural changes to address fragmentation and siloed care; 3) the importance of culturally responsive, low-barrier approaches; and 4) the critical role of policy in creating conditions for meaningful system change.” Their talk was recorded and will be available on the Advancing Health Outcomes YouTube channel.
4 Research Education Series On Monday, June 16, Rachelle Pullmer presented her work at the Spring 2025 webinar of the Psychiatry Research Program’s quarterly Research Education Series. Dr. Pullmer’s talk, “Beyond the scale: Challenging weight-centric healthcare and advancing inclusive research,” focused on initiatives within the Provincial Adult Tertiary Eating Disorders Program aimed at preventing weight-based harm in healthcare and integrating a weight-inclusive approach. The Summer 2025 Research Education Series webinar will feature speaker Saba Saleem, who will be presenting her work on the planetary health implications of virtual mental health care. A date has not yet been set, but it will likely be a lunch hour in August or early September. Everyone is welcome to attend. Email Research Coordinator Iva Cheung at icheung3@providencehealth.bc.ca for more information or to request the Teams link for the session. The quarterly Research Education Series is a self-approved group learning activity (Section 1) as dened by the Maintenance of Certication Program of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. LLDOPA study currently recruiting participants Nicholas Ainsworth is recruiting participants for the LLDOPA study, which seeks to understand whether L-DOPA, a medication commonly used to treat Parkinson’s disease, could help with the movement and cognitive symptoms sometimes associated with depression in later life. This study will also examine how many participants can complete the 2-week L-DOPA challenge and what kinds of side eects they experience. Dr. Ainsworth seeks participants who meet these eligibility criteria: • Are age 60 years or older • Have symptoms of major depressive disorder • Can walk independently without a cane or walker • Live in the Lower Mainland Please share this opportunity widely! For more information, contact research coordinator Iva Cheung (icheung3@providencehealth.bc.ca). Care for CCD study currently recruiting participants Angela Russolillo is recruiting participants for the Care for CCD study to better understand how people with both a mental illness and a substance use disorder have experienced receiving health services. The study involves completing questionnaires and an initial interview (90 minutes) and follow-up interviews (45–60 minutes) every 6 months for 3 years. Dr. Russolillo and her team are seeking participants who meet these eligibility criteria: • Are age 19–65 years • Have both a mental illness and a substance use disorder • Were hospitalized within the past 6 months. Please circulate this opportunity! Contact the study team for more information.
5 Social and health safety nets can help reduce reincarceration rates Last June, Advancing Health scientist Dr. Amanda Slaunwhite was appointed as the Scientic Director, Correctional Health Services at BC Mental Health and Substance Use Services, which is part of the Provincial Health Services Authority. We sat down with her to discuss the scope of her research and the importance of her work as Canada navigates the ongoing overdose crisis. As the Scientic Director for Correctional Health Services, Dr. Slaunwhite works with clinicians, operational leaders, and allied health professionals within the 10 provincial correctional centres to do research focused on the health of people incarcerated in the province. Her work answers the big picture questions like “Are our services making a dierence in the lives of people who are incarcerated?” Her research also helps the government identify gaps in the services and evaluate the impact of the services on the population. “Lived experience is key to informing research,” said Dr. Slaunwhite. “I work with people with lived experience of incarceration to be able to identify what types of research we should be doing. We also collaborate to analyze data on the health status of incarcerated people to understand what the data is showing us from the perspective of people who have experienced the system.” Read more. Stories from our network: A daily dose of antibiotic might curb an STI epidemic In Canada, rates of syphilis, chlamydia, and gonorrhea are increasing. This contrasts with HIV, where preventative drugs have successfully decreased infection rates in many areas. New research by Advancing Health scientist, Troy Grennan has found a promising approach for bacterial STI prevention: pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) using the common antibiotic doxycycline (i.e., doxyPrEP). Read more. Colorectal cancer leaves lasting toll on womens sexual health A study led by Advancing Health's Mary De Vera found women with CRC are more likely to experience painful sex, early menopause and other sexual health issues. The study is one of the rst to use population-level data to explore sexual health outcomes for colorectal cancer survivors. Learn more. Delivering AIs promise of better health care Advancing health scientist, Dr. Anita Palepu is co-leading a novel network at UBC with a suite of research projects that are already underway and demonstrating the transformative potential of AI. The goal is to bridge cutting-edge technology with compassionate, high-quality care that puts patients and people at the centre. Read more.
6 New evidence prompts funding of rituximab for all British Columbians with membranous nephropathy The results of a study led by Advancing Health scientist, Dr. Sean Barbour found that using generic rituximab to treat membranous nephropathy may actually cost the health-care system less than using cyclosporine and still gain healthy life years for patients. Read more. Successful HCV Treatment with DAAs Linked to Lower Extrahepatic Manifestation Risk Results from a study conducted by Advancing Health scientist, Dr. Naveed Janjua have found that successful DAA treatment leading to sustained virologic response (SVR) is linked to lower risks of chronic kidney disease (CKD), stroke, major adverse cardiac events (MACE), and neurocognitive disorders, but not type 2 diabetes, compared with no treatment. Read more. Research in practice: June Evidence Speaks: June’s edition of The Evidence Speaks included Advancing Health scientist, Dr. John Staples and his work on the correlation between road accident injuries and productivity loss costs; Dr. Martin Schechter’s paper on how Indigenous Peoples who use drugs were disproportionately impacted by public health emergencies including Covid-19 due to intergenerational trauma; and Drs. Wei Zhang and Bohdan Nosyk micro-costing analysis of a digital STBBI-testing program, GetCheckedOnline, to determine its feasibility and scalability as a health intervention program. Read more. Upcoming Event: Providence Research presents: The Past, Present and Future of Evidence Based Medicine,a guest lecture by Dr. Gordon Guyatt This summer, attend a guest lecture by Dr. Gord Guyatt, a pioneer of Evidence-Based-Medicine (EBM) in Canada and a Canadian Medicine Hall of Famer. Register here. Awards and recognition: Congratulations, Dr. Staples! Advancing Health scientist, Dr. John A Staples was awarded the Martin M Homan Award for Excellence in Research. Dr. Staples’ research interests include trac safety and medical risk factors for injury. Congratulations, Dr. Sedlak! Advancing Health scientist, Dr. Tara Sedlak was awarded the Graydon Meneilly Award for Excellence in Mentoring in 2025. She is the director of the Leslie Diamond Women’s Heart Health Clinic. Her research interests include, etiologies of myocardial infarction and chest pain in women with norma coronary arteries and therapeutic strategies in microvascular coronary dysfunction and coronary vasospasm.
7 Spring 2025 BC-CfE Update puts the focus on syndemic conditions On June 7th, the BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS (BC-CfE) hosted a range of healthcare providers in Downtown Vancouver for the Spring 2025 BC-CfE Update: Focus on Syndemics. This open educational event brought together the latest information on HIV and syndemic conditions including hepatitis C, substance use, mental health and bacterial STIs. We had a jam-packed schedule of expert speakers that included Drs. Viviane Lima, Junine Toy, & Victor Leung speaking on Doxycycline for the prevention of b-STIs, followed by a case discussion including Drs. Mark Hull and Peter Phillips and Aaron Purdie. Drs. Naveed Janjua, Jerey Joy and Alnoor Ramji provided a comprehensive update on Hepatitis C. This was followed by Dr. Silvia Guillemi, Yogeeta Dosanjh and Dr. Kate Salters who updated the audience on the developments at the Hope to Health Research & Innovation Centre implementing a syndemic approach to clinical care in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. In the nal session, Chase Fisher and Dr. Anil Maharaj discussed clinical and therapeutic innovations in the care of substance use disorder. For those unable to attend, the video recordings of the presentations will be available online shortly. Bookmark our video page or check our social media accounts when the videos will be available. Mark your calendars on Friday, October 10, 2025 for the Fall 2025 Update, and kick o your Thanksgiving weekend with another day of engaging presentations. Event details will be out later this summer. The BC-CfE raises the alarm about rising incidence of HIV in Canada and threats to global progress Despite the groundbreaking work done to implement the BC-CfE’s Treatment as Prevention® and HIV Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis programs in many jurisdictions, Canada is losing ground to HIV/AIDS across the country. The latest available government statistics for 2023 show a 35% uptick in HIV cases in Canada compared to 2022, with rates expected to be higher yet again in 2024 and in 2025 data.
8 Meanwhile, the United States has substantially decreased funding to domestic programs currently supported by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Medicare, and international programs supported by PEPFAR (the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief) and USAID. UNAIDS estimates another 6.6 million new HIV infections and 4.2 million AIDS-related deaths between 2025 and 2029 if US government cuts continue. With the gathering of the G7 last week, BC-CfE Executive Director & Physician-in-Chief Dr. Julio Montaner is raising the alarm more urgently, calling on Canada and other global leaders to redouble their eorts to prevent the catastrophic consequences that these cuts will have to HIV treatment and prevention worldwide. Please read and join us in sharing some of the following calls to action: • BC-CfE – The BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS national Summit raises alarm about rising incidence of HIV in Canada and threats to global progress • The Hill Times – The G7’s HIV/AIDS response wanes precisely when global leadership is required • Vancouver Sun – B.C. experts sound the alarm over rising number of HIV cases • Globe and Mail – ‘Nation-building' projects should also reect Canadian values’ Dr. Aniqa Shahid receives 2025 Governor Generals Gold Medal Congratulations to Dr. Aniqa Shahid who received the 2025 Governor General’s Gold Medal earlier this month during the SFU Faculty of Health Sciences (FHS) convocation! This prestigious award recognizes outstanding academic achievement and is among the highest doctoral honours conferred to graduate students. Her thesis ‘HIV Proviral Evolutionary Dynamics and Genetic Compartmentalization During Long-Term Suppressive Antiretroviral Therapy’ garnered top marks for providing new methods and insights to help advance our understanding of the HIV reservoir. A well-deserved honour Dr. Shahid! You can learn more about this award and her work thanks to SFU FHS: https://www.sfu.ca/fhs/news-events/news/2025/passionate-researcher-receives-gov-general-award.html. City of Vancouver paves the way for inhalation sites at Hope to Health In early June, Vancouver City Council voted to amend health bylaws for supervised drug inhalation in the latest step in getting nal Health Canada approval to open the six inhalation rooms at the Hope to Health Research & Innovation Centre. As drug consumption trends shift increasingly from injection to inhalation, the need has never been greater for supervised inhalation options to prevent fatal overdoses and connect people with the care and supports they require. Dr. Julio Montaner sat down with the The Globe and Mail and City News to discuss the substantial impact & benets these inhalation rooms will have on harm reduction strategies and the lives of those who inhale or smoke their substances in Vancouver's DTES.
9 HLIs Dr. Pat Camp and Dr. David Granville Recognized with UBC Faculty of Medicine Distinguished Achievement Awards Each year, the UBC Faculty of Medicine recognizes faculty members who have made exceptional contributions in the areas of education, research and/or service, and who are dedicated to advancing both the Faculty’s values and vision of transforming health for everyone. The HLI’s Dr. Pat Camp and Dr. David Granville were awarded in the Excellence in Clinical or Applied Research category for their outstanding research and scholarly contributions. Dr. Stephanie Sellers Awarded the UBC Department of Medicine Faculty Research Award Congratulations to the HLI’s Dr. Stephanie Sellers for being awarded the St. Paul’s Hospital Faculty Research Award in recognition of her outstanding research and scholarly contributions! UBC Department of Medicine Research Expo 2025 On June 18th, the Department of Medicine celebrated its longstanding commitment to research excellence across the full spectrum of academic medicine. Graduate students in the Experimental Medicine program and clinical residents alike presented their research projects to trainees, professors and clinicians represented in the Department of Medicine. HLI Associate Member Dr. Emily Brigham delivered the keynote address, “And into the Forest I Go”, oering reections on her career progression and insights into her research on environmental exposure, metabolism, and respiratory health. Dina Abbas, a third-year PhD student in Dr. Sin’s lab, gave a trainee talk in the morning about her research focused on understanding the impact of e-cigarettes on people’s lungs. In the afternoon, several trainees at the HLI presented posters on their research topics in engineering heart tissue (Hattie Luo), cystic brosis (Naomi Potter and Jasleen Kaur Matta), heart valve degeneration (Hacina Gill), asthma therapy (Asma Tanveer), vaping (Alexandra Schmidt), COPD (Elizabeth Guinto), long-COVID (Estefanía Espín Armas), and equity, diversity and inclusion in research (Jinelle Panton). Congratulations to Hacina Gill for winning a poster prize. A big thanks to HLI PIs Drs. Stephanie Sellers and Yuan Yao for poster adjudication, and to Cassie Gilchrist and Jasleen Kaur Matta for serving on the Research Expo Student Committee. Dr. Pat Camp, Physical Therapy Dr. David Granville, Pathology & Laboratory Medicine
Research Program PHC Department of Anesthesiology Research Group at the UBC APT Research Day 2025! Sara Niyyati gave an oral presentation on the Patient Advisory Council Featured Lightning Talks: • Narjis AlHusseini and Dr. Janny Xue Chen Ke: “Development of an Innovation Roadmap” • Jaycee Farmer and Dr. Stephan Schwarz: “Long-Term Trends in Gabapentinoid, Opioid and Concurrent Use in Spinal Cord Injury” • Dr. Michael Jew “Percutaneous cryoneurolysis for rib fractures and excision case report” • Dr. Alana Flexman: Understanding Canadian Residency Program Directors’ Attitudes Towards Workplace Diversity” • Dr. Vishal Varshney: “ Dorsal Root Ganglion Stimulation for Post-Herpectic Neuralgia” and “Risk Factors for Spinal Cord Stimulator Explant SR” • Dr. Janny Xue Chen Ke “Gaps in perioperative healthcare delivery in the month following an earthquake SR” • Mena Burr, Dr. Trina Montemurro and Dr. Su-Yin MacDonell “Sip Til Send project” PHC Sustainability Fair Dr. Stephanie Alexis, Dr. Rajamohan and Pieter Swart participated in the PHC Sustainability Fair by highlighting their Carbon Pulse Project: Comparing Greenhouse Gas Emissions Produced using Inhalational Anesthestics versus Intravenous Anesthetic Techniques in Cardiac Surgery. Coming Soon: Clinician Feedback and Evaluation of Mindful Garden Devices in Cardiac Surgery Intensive Care Unit (CSICU) Dr. Alana Flexman will be gathering clinician feedback on the MindfulGarden device in the CSICU. Clinicians will be provided with the MindfulGarden device to assist in distracting, engaging, and de-escalating behaviours associated with delirium. Recent Publications Department members in bold font • Flexman, A. Bridging the Global Divide: Amplifying Voices of Low and Middle Income Countries in Perioperative Neuroscience Research. Journal of Neurosurgical Anesthesiology 37(3):p 241, July 2025. • Chau, A., Preston, R., Wieczorek, P.M. et al. Exploring clinical conundrums in obstetric anesthesia through interactive polls and panel discussion: insights from Canadian obstetric anesthesiology experts. Can J Anesth/J Can Anesth (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12630-025-02986-4 • Farmer JR, Sutherland JM, Field TS, McIsaac DI, Gelb AW, Zhou LW, Sun T, Schwarz SKW, Flexman AM. Factors associated with adverse outcomes following perioperative stroke after
Research Program noncardiac surgery. J Stroke Cerebrovasc Dis. 2025 Jun 5;34(8):108346. doi: 10.1016/j.jstrokecerebrovasdis.2025.108346. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 40479870. • Ke, Janny Xue Chen et al. 2025. Frequency and timing of complications within the first postpartum year in the United States and Canada: a systematic review and meta-analysis. American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, (In Press) • Chen BT, Song WHC, Chau A, MacDonell SY. The magnitude and impact of noise on patient care in a tertiary postanesthesia care unit: an observational study and survey of nursing perspectives. Can J Anaesth. 2025 May 20. Epub ahead of print. • Moores C, Maguire D, Fruci VP, Jen TTH. Regional anesthesia use as a bridge to the provision of medical assistance in dying. Can J Anaesth. 2025 May 2. doi: 10.1007/s12630-025-02956-w. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 40314872. • Farmer, J.R., Sutherland, J.M., Field, T.S., Schwarz,S.K.W., Flexman, A.M. Outcomes Following Perioperative Stroke in Cardiac Surgery Patients: A Retrospective Cohort Study Journal of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Anesthesia, In Press • Saulnier L, Chau A, Crowell P, Bright S, Massey S. Obstetric quality of recovery: A weak surrogate measure of psychological distress and psychological wellness for cesarean delivery parturients—A prospective observational study. Journal of Health Psychology. (2025); In Press
10 Providence Researchers among recipients of UBC Faculty of Medicine Distinguished Achievement Awards Congratulations to Drs. Drs. Pat Camp, David Granville, Daniel Vigo, and Adeera Levin, recipients of this year’s UBC Faculty of Medicine Distinguished Achievement Awards for their exceptional contributions contributions in the areas of education, research and/or service, and who are dedicated to advancing both the Faculty’s values and vision of transforming health for everyone. Learn more. Providence Researchers receive 2025 VCHRI Innovation and Translational Research Awards Congratulations to the recipients of the 2025 Innovation and Translational Research Awards from the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute, including Centre for Heart Lung Innovation researchers Dr. David Granville and Dr. Stephanie Sellers. Learn more.
11 Thats all for now. Thank you for reading, we will see you next month, with the upcoming publication of The Research Review Magazine: Summer 2025 A place where patient-centered research is driven by social justice, and redenes better health and care globally. Learn more at providenceresearch.ca We acknowledge with gratitude that we live and work on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Website: https://www.providenceresearch.ca/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/providence-research Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/providence_research/ Bluesky: https://bsky.app/prole/providenceresearch.bsky.social Email: research@providencehealth.bc.ca Mailing Address: Providence Research 10th Floor, 1190 Hornby Street, Vancouver, B.C. V6Z 2K5 This ipbook was made using Simplebooklet, a Canadian company based in Vancouver, BC.