Society and health

Population health research at UVic
Biomedical research at UVic

Alcohol spells trouble for many and that’s where UVic clinical psychologist Dr. Tim Stockwell comes in. He studies drinking patterns and their consequences across BC as part of a major national project to monitor alcohol, drug and tobacco use. Stockwell is director of UVic’s Centre for Addictions Research of BC, which studies substance use, harm reduction and addiction. Learn more about addictions research at UVic.

National leaders in health research

Health research at UVic is broadly represented across all faculties and multiple health-related research centres. Our researchers are national leaders in the areas of:

aging
mental health and addictions
community health promotion
Aboriginal health
health informatics
bioethics
environment and health
biomedical research

Community-based health research

UVic is widely known for its commitment to community-based research. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the health arena. UVic researchers are working with community groups, governments, health authorities and other health care agencies to provide the evidence-based knowledge that decision-makers need to improve the health and well-being of Canadians.

Learn more about population health research at UVic:

Researcher spotlights

Tackling homelessness

Dr. Bernie Pauly As a registered nurse, Bernie Pauly’s life was about the difficulties people face in accessing health care. As a professor and community-based researcher at UVic, she turns to the bigger picture and imagines a day when people don’t have to sleep on concrete beds.

“Sleeping outside and having no place to call home have major consequences for a person’s physical, emotional and mental health,” says Pauly, who works closely with community groups, local and provincial governments, and key social service agencies to find solutions to homelessness in the Victoria region. Learn more about Dr. Pauly’s research.

Safe and healthy youth

“Injuries, homicides and suicides are killing our youth more often than any single disease,” says UVic psychologist Bonnie Leadbeater. Her research focuses on the mental health of children and adolescents, the transition to young adulthood for high-risk youth, and the causes and mental health consequences of bullying.

Leadbeater is co-author of the WITS program — Walk away, Ignore, Talk and Seek help—which works with communities to prevent young people being victimized by their peers. Learn more about the WITS program.

The challenges of aging

What mental health challenges are experienced by Canadian seniors? What can be done to make their lives easier? For answers, UVic clinical psychologist Holly Tuokko looks at how cognitive and other mental health changes evolve in later life and the impact they have on everyday tasks like driving, financial management and end-of-life decision-making.

Tuokko is director of UVic’s Centre on Aging, which partners with organizations, health care providers and governments to study the social and psychological aspects of aging, population health and health services delivery.

Syphilis rates are rising in Canada and UVic microbiologist Caroline Cameron is on the case. She’s one of a handful of researchers in the world who studies this disease and the only one in Canada examining it at a basic science level. She says, “A greater understanding of the mechanisms of infection will enable us to develop new methods for diagnosis and prevention.”

Learn more about biomedical research at UVic:

Researcher spotlights

Taking aim at cancer

Anyone who’s had radiation therapy for cancer, or has seen others go through it, knows how unpleasant the side effects can be. Medical physicist Andrew Jirasek wants to change that.

Working with researchers at the BC Cancer Agency’s Vancouver Island Centre, he’s developing a technique to measure how well radiation doses are hitting their mark. “The idea is to maximize damage to cancer cells while avoiding nearby healthy cells,” he says. “With this new technique, treatment plans and doses can be verified more accurately.” Read more about Jirasek's research.

Brain to brawn

Neuroscientist and kinesiologist Paul Zehr's research on the neural control of rhythmic movement may provide break¬throughs for improving the lives of stroke and other neurotrauma patients.

Focusing on neurons in the spinal cord that link the arms and legs, Zehr’s research shows that people whose communication between the brain and spinal cord is weakened may be able to achieve much greater levels of physical rehabilitation when arms and legs are stimulated to work in coordinated action.

Battle of the superbug

Most of us try not to dwell on all the nasty disease-causing bacteria lurking out there. But biochemist Alisdair Boraston thinks about them all the time.

As the Canada Research Chair in Molecular Interactions, he’s hot on the trail of a new weapon in the war against Streptococcus pneumoniae, the microbe responsible for pneumonia and other diseases. His team has identified several proteins that the bacterium uses to attack lung cells and—with potential new drug treatments in mind—is investigating ways to stop or slow them down. Learn more about Dr. Boraston's research.