Two Dalhousie researchers in the Faculty of Medicine are being celebrated with prestigious national awards from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), recognizing outstanding contributions across the career spectrum in health research.<\/p>\n
Dr. Francesca Di Cara<\/a>,\u00a0associate\u00a0professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology\u00a0and Canada Research Chair in Human Immunology and Host Pathogen Interactions, has received the\u00a0Bhagirath Singh Early Career Award in Infection and Immunity<\/a>.<\/p>\n Dr. Jill Hayden<\/a>, professor in the Department of Community Health and Epidemiology, has been awarded the\u00a0Barer\u2011Flood Senior Career Prize in Health Services and Policy Research<\/a>.<\/p>\n Together, the awards highlight the depth and breadth of research excellence at Dalhousie,\u00a0from fundamental discoveries in immune regulation to patient\u2011centred\u00a0health services research with direct impact on care delivery.<\/p>\n Advancing discovery in infection and immunity<\/p>\n The Bhagirath Singh Early Career Award in Infection and Immunity recognizes early\u2011career researchers who have\u00a0demonstrated\u00a0exceptional creativity,\u00a0productivity\u00a0and leadership in advancing the understanding of infectious disease and immune function. The award\u00a0honours\u00a0the legacy of Dr. Bhagirath Singh, a pioneering Canadian immunologist and mentor.<\/p>\n Dr. Di Cara studies how the body\u2019s immune system works and how it is influenced by the way cells use and manage energy. Her research looks closely at\u00a0how various immune cells use\u00a0their nutrients such as lipids (fats)\u00a0to keep immune responses balanced \u2014 and what can go wrong when that balance is lost, leading to inflammation or infection.<\/p>\n Her work has revealed an important new role for\u00a0peroxisomes,\u00a0tiny structures found inside\u00a0almost every\u00a0cell that help manage chemical reactions needed for normal cell function. Dr. Di Cara discovered that these structures also play a key role in helping the immune system send and control its signals.<\/p>\n By studying fruit flies, mice and human cells, Dr. Di Cara has shown that peroxisomes help organize how immune signals are turned on and off inside cells\u00a0and manage inflammation, the silent killer in many diseases including inflammatory bowel\u00a0disease,\u00a0arthritis\u00a0and neurodegenerative\u00a0conditions.\u00a0This process affects how strongly the body reacts to threats like\u00a0infection.\u00a0<\/p>\n Her findings are changing how scientists understand immune control and could eventually help explain a wide range of health conditions\u00a0and find new therapies to threat immune\u00a0disorders\u00a0and chronic inflammation \u2014 from rare inherited disorders to common inflammatory and infectious diseases.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis award recognizes\u00a0the\u00a0need and importance of\u00a0fundamental\u00a0research in order to improve our therapeutic\u00a0approaches\u201d says Dr.\u00a0Di\u00a0Cara. \u201cEspecially when\u00a0it\u00a0comes to\u00a0inflammation,\u00a0the knowledge\u00a0of\u00a0the\u00a0fundamental\u00a0mechanisms that help our\u00a0body to\u00a0maintain\u00a0and return to homeostasis after fighting an\u00a0insult\u00a0is\u00a0quintessential for novel,\u00a0effective,\u00a0and\u00a0safer\u00a0 therapies.\u00a0Our research aims to lead to novel\u00a0therapies to\u00a0control chronic inflammation\u201d<\/p>\n Since joining Dalhousie, Dr. Di Cara has built an internationally recognized research program, secured major peer\u2011reviewed funding, and\u00a0has\u00a0trained a growing cohort of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. Her work exemplifies the CIHR Institute of Infection and Immunity\u2019s mandate to advance knowledge that improves prevention,\u00a0diagnosis\u00a0and treatment of disease.<\/p>\n Transforming care through health services research<\/p>\n The Barer\u2011Flood Senior Career Prize in Health Services and Policy Research is one of CIHR\u2019s most distinguished\u00a0honours, awarded to a senior investigator whose career has made a sustained and influential contribution to improving health systems and health policy. Named after Drs. Morris Barer and Colleen Flood, the prize recognizes research that strengthens how health care is organized,\u00a0delivered,\u00a0and experienced.<\/p>\n Dr. Hayden\u2019s career has been defined by a commitment to ensuring that high\u2011quality evidence leads to real improvements in patient care. An internationally recognized leader in back pain research, she has spent more than two decades synthesizing evidence on treatments for chronic low back pain and studying how care is delivered across health systems.<\/p>\n A recent focus of Dr. Hayden\u2019s work is the\u00a0ExRX\u00a0(Exercise Prescription) toolkit, a research\u2011based resource designed to help health-care providers use exercise as a first\u2011line treatment for chronic low back pain. Chronic low back pain is one of the most common and disabling health conditions worldwide, yet evidence\u2011based exercise is not consistently used in care.<\/p>\n The\u00a0ExRX\u00a0toolkit aims to make prescribing exercise more practical and accessible for clinicians, while helping patients understand and follow exercise recommendations. By supporting real\u2011world use in clinical settings, the project helps close the gap between research evidence and everyday health-care practice.<\/p>\n \u201cReceiving this\u00a0Award\u00a0is a tremendous\u00a0honour, one I gladly share with the outstanding team and partners behind our work,\u201d\u00a0says Dr. Hayden.\u00a0\u201cI look forward to carrying that\u00a0momentum into our next project -\u202fdeveloping an evidence-informed, technology-enabled toolkit to better support patients living with chronic low back pain and the healthcare providers who care for them.\u201d<\/p>\n Dr. Hayden\u2019s leadership has had national and international impact, informing clinical guidelines, shaping policy\u00a0discussions\u00a0and mentoring the next generation of health services researchers.<\/p>\n Celebrating excellence across the research continuum<\/p>\n Together, these CIHR career awards underscore the Faculty of Medicine\u2019s strength across the full research continuum,\u00a0from discovery science to health system transformation.<\/p>\n \u201cDr. Di Cara and Dr.\u00a0Hayden represent\u00a0distinctly different approaches\u00a0to research, yet both are united by a commitment to improving health outcomes\u00a0through impactful research,\u201d says\u00a0Dr. Eileen Denovan-Wright, associate dean, research. \u201cTheir national recognition reflects not only individual excellence, but the collaborative research culture at Dalhousie.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two Dalhousie researchers in the Faculty of Medicine are being celebrated with prestigious national awards from the Canadian…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":518919,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[49,48,84,1058,44,994],"class_list":["post-518918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-medicine","tag-news","tag-research"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=518918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/518919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=518918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=518918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=518918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}