Grey Matters - IA Newsletter - April 2010
In this issue of Grey Matters
- Message from the Scientific Director
- Kudos
- Institute News
- Research News
- "The Brightest Minds"
- Rising Stars
- Partnerships
- IA-Affiliated Meetings
- Recent IA Funding Highlights
- Current Funding Opportunities
- Student and Trainee Opportunities
- Send Us Your News
Message from the Scientific Director
Welcome to the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Institute of Aging's 10th anniversary year. In this first issue of Grey Matters for 2010, we highlight some of the Institute's established and emerging researchers in aging, and bring you up to date on Institute news and upcoming events.
The Institute has just published its Biennial Report 2007-2009, showcasing IA's activities over the past two years, and highlighting some of the researchers who are committed to improving the health and wellbeing of both current and future older Canadians. In tandem with the Biennial Report, we released New Emerging Teams in Aging: Innovation and Impact, a collection of the individual stories of the 14 teams funded under the New Emerging Teams initiative. (Both reports can be found in PDF and HTML format on the Institute's website.)
The fifth annual Institute of Aging Summer Program in Aging, SPA 2010, will take place at Jasper Park Lodge in Alberta from June13th to 17th. We are delighted to have the Alberta Centre on Aging at the University of Alberta in Edmonton as co-hosts, with Dr. Carole Estabrooks and Dr. Laurel Strain chairing the program committee. (See the SPA website for information on the objectives of the SPA)
I would encourage each of you to consider nominations for the Betty Havens Prize in Knowledge Translation. The Institute offers this prize annually in honour of a pioneer in Canadian gerontology, who was committed to the movement of research knowledge to practice and policy. The award is given to individuals, teams or organizations that have advanced the translation of research in aging.
Kudos
We congratulate Dr. Huber Warner, Associate Dean for Research at the University of Minnesota and a recently retired Institute Advisory Board member, on his article profiling the CIHR's Institute of Aging published in the Canadian Journal on Aging (CJA 28(4): 391-394 (2009). The article entitled The Longevity Dividend: Why Invest in Basic Aging Research? discusses the need to shift focus from research on life span to research on health span in order to find out which age-related changes are actually disease risk factors as opposed to simply benign age-dependent changes (e.g. greying hair).
Institute News
CIHR Primary Healthcare Summit
Joining ten of CIHR's Institutes, IA supported the January meeting: Patient-Oriented Primary Healthcare – Scaling Up Innovation. By invitation, IA advisory board members, Dr. Chris Patterson and Dr. Denise Cloutier-Fisher, along with former IAB Chair, Dr. Dot Pringle, attended select summit workshops, reporting back key issues of relevance to health services for an aging population and to caring for the elderly. Summit program and presentation slides can be found on the organizer's website.
BC Network on Aging Research (BCNAR)
IA was also a major partner in BCNAR's 5th Annual Conference - Opportunities at the Crossroads of Scientific Discovery: Design and Analysis of Longitudinal Data for Interdisciplinary Research Across the Life Span - held in January. Five of the Institute's CLSA Post-doctoral Fellows were brought to this Vancouver event to participate in cutting-edge discussions on collection, management and harmonization of longitudinal data presented by Canadian and international experts. Dr. Anne Martin-Matthews's opening remarks describing the developmental path of the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging were followed by the Institute of Aging keynote, Dr. Paul Burton, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology at University of Leicester, who spoke on sample size considerations in his talk, "How Big is Big?". A conference overview, speaker biographies and presentation abstracts can be found on the BCNAR conference website.
Canada-UK Study Tour
Through a generous partnership with the British High Commission-Science and Innovation Office and the extraordinary creativity of our Institute Advisory Board member Dr. Peter Lansley, Professor of Construction Management at the University of Reading, IA broadened its reach in Mobility in Aging by bringing together scientists and policy makers from both Canada and the UK to examine research on the extrinsic factors affecting mobility in old age. A week-long study tour in March engaged 9 leading Canadian scientists and policy experts largely from outside of the aging arena, in an exchange of ideas on age-supportive built environments. Delegates met with over 30 of their counter-parts at two UK locations, the Cities Institute at London Metropolitan University and the Edinburgh College of Art in Scotland, Invited discussants included Dr. John Beard, Director Department of Ageing and Life Course WHO, Geneva, and Professor John Frank, Director of the Scottish Collaboration for Public Health Research and Policy and inaugural Scientific Director of the CIHR Institute of Population & Public Health. The wide-ranging discussions have already led to plans for collaboration between Canadian and UK investigators, as well as among Canadian delegates themselves, on research and knowledge translation in this relatively under-investigated area.
Dr. Peter Lansley; John Armitt, Chair, Olympic Delivery Authority
& Chair, Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (UK);
Dr. Anne Martin-Matthews; Dr. John Beard
Mobility in Aging Emerging Teams Workshop
In late March, the Institute hosted a meeting of the Emerging Teams currently funded under the Mobility in Aging (MIA) initiative. Participants included the Principal Investigator, a senior scientist, a new investigator and a promising trainee from each of the six MIA Teams funded in 2007 and 2008, along with the principal investigator from each of the seven team proposals that have passed the Letter of Intent stage in the 2009 competition. Both science and team function were the focus of discussion at this Vancouver meeting which examined, characteristics and benefits of high-functioning teams, indicators of team success,and strategies to improve team function.The meeting closed with an exchange of ideas on how the Institute of Aging could best support the work of the MIA Teams. For more information on the Mobility in Aging initiative please refer to the Mobility in Aging web page. A copy of the MIA Teams meeting report will be posted there soon.
A leading member of each of the currently funded MIA teams also presented an overview of the team's work with an emphasis on knowledge translation activities at an IA-sponsored symposium during the International Fall Prevention Conference that took place in Vancouver immediately prior to the MIA Teams Meeting.
Research News
Is it just aging – or something more serious?
It happens all the time – you can't remember where you put your keys, or what happened to that important piece of mail. We call them senior's moments and, for most people, that's exactly what they are – examples of the kinds of relatively innocuous memory loss that comes with aging.
But underneath the casual reference to senior's moments, the fear lurks for many people – what if this isn't normal aging? What if it's a sign of Alzheimer's disease?
Dr. Sylvie Belleville, Professor of Psychology at the University of Montreal, wants to ease that worry, by identifying those people who are likely to go on to develop Alzheimer's disease or another form of dementia and those who are simply experiencing a condition known as mild cognitive impairment, or MCI.
Her research to date has focussed on what is commonly called the executive function – the part of the brain that is responsible for complex reasoning and abstract thinking. By following people with MCI on a yearly basis, she has been able to observe a correlation between a declining ability to perform tasks that require the executive function and the likelihood of developing Alzheimer's disease.
"When deficits in memory are accompanied by deficit in executive function, it signals that something is going on that is not normal, that there is a bad prognosis," she says.
Dr. Belleville's interest in the role of executive function in Alzheimer's disease comes from her experience as a clinician working with people with Alzheimer's disease nearly 25 years ago.
"At that time, Alzheimer's was considered a memory disorder," she says. "But when I was working with those patients, I realized that they were frequently complaining about their executive function. For instance, they said they couldn't cook if there were a lot of people in the kitchen – not because they forgot the recipe, but because they couldn't focus on both the cooking and the conversation."
As part of her research, Dr. Belleville also examined the physical changes that take place in the brain with cognitive impairment. She hypothesized that people with MCI would be able to compensate for lost function by recruiting other areas of the brain to carry out that function. She found that this is, indeed, the case, and that, as she also thought, people with more advanced cognitive impairment don't show the same ability.
"Alzheimer's disease is a degenerative disease," Dr. Belleville says. "You don't wake up one day and you have it all of a sudden. It's interesting to know what's happening in the brain as it develops."
Right now, by the time people are diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, they have already experienced significant brain damage. Dr. Belleville's research could help in diagnosing Alzheimer's earlier. That way, she says, when a medication that can stop the disease is developed – and it will be, she firmly believes – it can be used as early as possible in people who will develop Alzheimer's. Equally important, its use can be avoided in people whose MCI is unlikely to progress to Alzheimer's, sparing them the side effects that come with any medication.
For now, Dr. Belleville is committed to continuing her work with a larger group of people, applying her findings to better enable physicians to diagnose Alzheimer's disease earlier – and to help reassure people that sometimes a senior's moment truly is only a senior's moment.
"The Brightest Minds"
Here we feature the ongoing achievements of past winners of Institute of Aging trainee awards and prizes, and past participants in IA trainee programs.
Former SPA trainee giving back
Her first time attending the Summer Program in Aging (SPA), in 2006, Dr. Susan Slaughter was a doctoral student at the University of Calgary. The thing she remembers most was just how much she enjoyed meeting people also interested in gerontological research.
"I especially appreciated the time to discuss specific aspects of my doctoral research proposal with the mentors who came," she says.
Now a post-doctoral fellow in the Knowledge Utilization Studies Program in the Faculty of Nursing at the University of Alberta, Dr. Slaughter is coming back to SPA this summer – but this time, she's a member of the planning committee.
"We are building on the successes of previous SPAs to develop an excellent interactive experience for SPA 2010," she says. "I am especially pleased that we are planning to optimize participants' opportunities to connect with the mentors who will be attending."
Dr. Slaughter's postdoctoral research is testing an intervention to facilitate health-care aides in long-term care facilities to help older adults with dementia maintain their mobility. She is encouraging the aides to help the seniors carry out an exercise called "sit-to-stand" at least twice during their shifts as they go about their day. "Being able to stand up is fundamental to getting out of bed, going to the toilet, getting into the bath, going to the dining room or taking part in an activity," she says. "It's related to absolutely everything."
While residents maintain their quality of life and avoid the numerous hazards of immobility, health-care aides also benefit, Dr. Slaughter points out. They will have reduced strain on their backs and will not need to find another aide or mechanical lift to help them.
"Health-care aides care for a lot of people," she says. "Whatever innovation is introduced needs to be practical, feasible and sustainable within the context of available resources."
"My work has always involved having one foot in practice and the other in research," she adds. "I just didn't call it knowledge translation until now."
Rising Stars
CIHR-IA Age+ Prize winners
The CIHR Institute of Aging Age+ Prize recognizes excellence in research on aging carried out in Canada by graduate and postdoctoral students and clinical residents from all disciplines, working in the field of aging. It is awarded to the author of a published, scientific article on aging.
The Institute of Aging is pleased to announce the latest winners:
- Manon Guay, University of Sherbrooke
Guay, M., Desrosiers, J. & Dubois, M.-F. (2009). Validation of an algorithm used by trained visiting homemakers to select bathroom equipment. Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy. 76: 233-243. - Kevin Trewartha, Concordia University
Trewartha, K. M., Endo, A., Li, K.Z.H., & Penhune, V.B. (2009). Examining Prepotent Response Suppression in Aging: A Kinematic Analysis. Psychology and Aging. 24 (2): 450-461. - Nancy Newall, University of Manitoba
Newall, N. E., Chipperfield, J. G., Daniels, L. M., Hladkyj, S., & Perry, R. P. (2009). Regret in later life: Exploring the relationships between regret frequency, secondary control beliefs, and health in older individuals. The International Journal of Aging and Human Development, 68, 261-288. - Lindsay Nagamatsu, University of British Columbia
Nagamatsu, LS, Ambrose, TYL, Carolan, P, Handy, TC. (2009). Are impairments in visual-spatial attention a critical factor for increased falls risk in seniors? An event-related potential study. Neuropsychologia, 47: 2749-2755. - Sarah Fraser, Concordia University
Fraser, S.A., Li, K.Z.H., & Penhune, V.B. (2009). A comparison of motor skill learning in younger and older adults. Experimental Brain Research, 195: 419-427. - Sandra Webber, University of Manitoba
Webber, SC, Porter, MM, Gardiner, PF (2009). Modeling age-related neuromuscular changes in humans. Applied Physiology, Nutrition & Metabolism. 34(4):732-744. - Simona Brambati, University of Montreal
Brambati, SM, Belleville, S, Marie-Jeanne Kergoat, M-J, Chayer, S, Gauthier, S, Joubert, S. (2009). Single- and Multiple-Domain Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment: Two Sides of the Same Coin? Dementia and Geriatric Cognitive Disorders. 28:541–549. - Vladimir Ljubicic, York University
Ljubicic, V and Hood, DA. (2009). Diminished contraction-induced intracellular signalling towards mitochondrial biogenesis in aged skeletal muscle. Aging Cell 8: 394–404.
For information and how to apply for the Age+ Award, visit the IA web site.
Partnerships
Care Practice in Cognitive Impairment in Aging Program
Through this program, CIHR-IA and its partners recently funded seven grants (see "Funding Highlights" below) with the primary objective to better inform nursing care practice and improve the quality of clinical care provided to cognitively impaired older adults in institutional, home and community care settings.
It is expected that these grants will help address challenges in care practice, be they the result of evidence gaps or barriers to knowledge translation and exchange. Such investments will also increase our knowledge of how to improve the translation of research into nursing care practice.
This funding opportunity emerged through the Cognitive Impairment in Aging partnership, a consortium of private, non-governmental, voluntary and government organizations established to work together to further research in Alzheimer's Disease and other dementias (AD&D) and the application of that research to improve the quality of life of those suffering with AD&D.
The partners in this program included:
- Alzheimer Society of Canada
- Canadian Nurses Foundation
- Parkinson Society of Canada
- Canadian Home Care Association
- CIHR Institute of Circulatory and Respiratory Health
- CIHR Institute of Health Services and Policy Research
IA-Affiliated Meetings
The Institute of Aging is proud to be associated with the following conferences:
International Society for Gerontechnology (ISG) 7th World Conference
Vancouver, May 27-30, 2010
IA is proud to be a partner with the ISG in presenting a symposium on Canada-UK Collaborations in Gerontechnology, chaired by Dr. Peter Lansley of KT-EQUAL (UK) and a member of the IA's Institute Advisory Board. Collaborators in the Canada-UK New Dynamics of Aging research programme will showcase the important technology-related work being done by the network of researchers from each country being funded under this unique program.
IA is also supporting the ISG Master Class, Technologies for Active Aging, that provides a unique opportunity for emerging researchers in the area of aging and technology to interact for several days with international experts.
Public Health in Canada: Shaping the Future Together
Toronto, June 13-16, 2010
CIHR will present a pre-conference session, Grey Matters: Population Health from Mid-life through Old Age, on June 13. This session will spotlight aging as a determinant of population health, considering genetics, healthy weights, chronic disease, mobility, and physical and cognitive fitness. The complexity of lifestyle, social and employment status will be demonstrated. Speakers will also show how this demographic shift is driving innovations in research as well as policies, programs and products that ultimately benefit all age groups. An open discussion on the efforts of the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (CLSA) in accelerating such progress will follow.
See the IA Calendar of Events for other IA meetings as well as a partial listing of aging-related conferences for which we have received notification. If you are aware of others of national or international importance, please let us know at aging@interchange.ubc.ca.
Recent IA Funding Highlights
IA congratulates all the investigators who have received research funding through the latest competitions. Of the many funded, we focus in this issue on the Care Practice in Cognitive Impairment in Aging program described in the "Partnerships" section, and congratulate the following winners:
- Dr. Mary Catherine Ward-Griffin, University of Western Ontario
Building Partnerships in Community-Based Dementia Care - Dr. Dorothy Forbes, University of Western Ontario
Developing dementia care decisions through knowledge exchange in rural settings - Dr. Belinda Park, University of Alberta
Understanding emergency department care transitions for older adults with dementia - Dr. Jane McCusker, McGill University
Development of nursing tools for the detection of long-term facility residents with cognitive impairment who are at risk for delirium - Dr. Janice Keefe, Mount Saint Vincent University
Does timing of caregiver assessment make a difference: evaluating the impact with older spousal caregivers of persons with cognitive impairment - Dr. Laura Wagner, Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care
Disparities in nursing care processes: a focus on adverse event communication with cognitively impaired nursing home residents and families - Dr. Ging-Yuek Hsiung, University of British Columbia
A randomized controlled trial of group music therapy in the out-patient care of moderate Alzheimer disease: a patient and caregiver outcome study
Complete information on recent CIHR funding decisions can be seen on the CIHR website.
Current Funding Opportunities
- CIHR-IA Betty Havens Award for Knowledge Translation in Aging
Through the Betty Havens Award for Knowledge Translation in Aging, IA will recognize individual(s), team(s) or organization(s) that have advanced the translation of research in aging at a local or regional level. The maximum amount awarded for a single one-year award is $50,000 to recognize impact at the local or regional level in research on aging.
Nomination deadline: May 3, 2010 - CIHR Knowledge Translation Award
This award recognizes outstanding contribution to improving the health of individuals, providing more effective health services and products and strengthening the health care system at a national or international level. The prize consists of an award of $100,000.
Nomination deadline: May 3, 2010 - Collaborative Health Research Projects program
This program is funded by the Institute of Aging, CIHR's Knowledge Translation Branch and Institute of Musculoskeletal Health and Arthritis in partnership with the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC). It supports focused collaborative research projects involving any field of the natural sciences or engineering and the health sciences. If successful, the projects will be novel and lead to health benefits for Canadians, more effective health services, or economic development in health-related areas. The proposed project may range from fundamental knowledge creation to research on knowledge application relevant to industry or public policy. Typically, support will be for up to three years for defined projects (which are not existing research programs), with clear milestones and decision points.
Letter of Intent deadline: May 3, 2010 - Meetings, Planning and Dissemination Grant: Aging
This funding opportunity is intended to provide support for meetings, planning and/or dissemination activities that are consistent with the mandate of IA and stimulate research and knowledge translation and exchange beyond traditional recurring meetings or conferences. The maximum amount awarded for a single MPD - Aging grant is $10,000 for up to one year. Requests up to $25,000 will be accepted for eligible international partnership development activities.
Next application deadline: June 15, 2010
For all CIHR funding opportunities, visit the CIHR Funding Database.
Student and Trainee Opportunities
- CIHR-IA Student Poster Competition
A prize of $500 is awarded for the best research posters at the Canadian Association on Gerontology Annual Scientific and Educational Meeting (CAG ASEM) in each of the following categories: Master's, PhD, and Postdoctoral. Trainees must declare their intent to participate in the CAG Student Poster Competition when submitting their abstract to the CAG-ASEM.
Application deadline: April 30, 2010 - Age+ Prize
This prize recognizes excellence in research on aging carried out in Canada. Awarded annually to 10 to 15 authors of a published, scientific article on aging, the Age+ Award is aimed at graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and residents from all disciplines, conducting research in aging. Each award offered annually is $1,000. Applications are accepted 3 times a year.
Next application deadlines: May 1 and October 1, 2010 - Trainee Travel Awards
Travel Awards encourage interdisciplinary dialogue and cross-disciplinary exposure of research on aging and seniors' issues. IA provides travel funds for Masters and Doctoral students, and Post-doctoral fellows to present their work at a conference, workshop or symposium. Applications are accepted 3 times a year.
Next application deadline: July 15, 2010
For all the funding opportunities for trainees offered by the Institute of Aging, visit the Students and Trainees web page.
Send Us Your News
The Institute of Aging would like to hear from you. Send us an e-mail if you have interesting research news you would like to share.
Also let us know if you have any comments on our newsletter, or if you would like more information about the Institute of Aging.
CIHR - Institute of Aging
6303 NW Marine Drive
Vancouver, BC
V6T 1Z1
Tel: 604-822-0905
Fax: 604-822-0304
Email: aging@interchange.ubc.ca
