CHSRF/CIHR Chair Awards
The Canadian Health Services Research Foundation/Canadian Institutes of Health Research Chair Awards were created primarily to provide a mentoring and teaching resource for graduate and post-graduate students and junior faculty in applied health services and nursing research. The awards are intended to capitalize on the prior research and education experience of the recipients to accelerate capacity building in these areas. A total of 12 chairs have been awarded, based on a 10-year commitment, to research leaders based at universities across the country.
While the chairs will continue to conduct research, in contrast with traditional research chairs, the focus of their work is on mentoring and education. In keeping with the capacity building theme of the CADRE program, the chairs will focus on bringing new researchers to the point where they can independently contribute to applied health services and nursing research issues.
The objectives of the chair program are being achieved through three central components:
- educating and mentoring the next generation of applied health services and nursing researchers (graduate and post-graduate students, junior faculty, and others seeking career renewal opportunities in this field), many of whom may be supported by future foundation-funded career renewal and training awards;
- research that holds promise to expand the quality and relevance of the evidence base used in decision making by policy makers and health system managers; and
- linkage and exchange leadership for systematic planning and implementation of communication, dissemination and transfer activities to support the uptake of research by health-system decision makers. This leadership will be a catalyst to generate improved ongoing interaction between decision makers and researchers.
The chairs were established with financial support from the Foundation (50 percent), CIHR (40 percent) and regional co-sponsors (10 percent) including the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research, the Fonds de la recherche en santé du Québec, the Nova Scotia Health Research Foundation, the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care and the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority. Seven award holders have a health services orientation while the other five come from the nursing research community. In addition, each chair maintains a variety of partnerships with relevant decision-making organizations.
For additional information, please contact Pat Conrad by email or by telephone at (613) 728-2238.
