Everyone wants the best care possible for hospitalized children and their families. Children do better when their parents are involved in their care. Alberta Family Integrated Care (FICare) is a model of care that was adopted in Alberta’s neonatal intensive care units. With Alberta FICare parents are educated and supported to be a member of their baby’s neonatal care team as soon as they are ready and willing after admission. Alberta FICare improved parental mental health and confidence, which enabled earlier discharge. As the team who implemented Alberta FICare in all 14 NICUs within the province, we now want to know whether this model of care can benefit children and their families on pediatric units. Currently, we are looking for parents/caregivers/legal guardians of children admitted to Units 1, 2, 3, or 4 at Alberta Children's Hospital to complete a survey and a daily questionnaire. This will help us determine if implementing Alberta FICare will demonstrate similar positive results for children admitted to Alberta Children’s Hospital and their parents/caregivers as it did in NICUs. Previous (Phase 1: Qualitative Study) Currently, we are interviewing children and youth currently or recently admitted to Units 2, 3 or 4 at the Alberta Children’s Hospital and their parents/caregivers/legal guardians (hereafter referred to as "parents"). These interviews are meant to understand children's experiences in the hospital and parents opinions of the care they received while their child was in the hospital. We are also conducting interviews with healthcare providers and management teams at Alberta Children’s Hospital to understand the specific needs of these groups. If Alberta FICare can be adapted to enhance or improve the quality of care at Alberta Children’s Hospital, we will collaborate to share this model of care with other pediatric hospitals so all Canadian children can benefit.

Researchers at the University of Calgary are interested in understanding the experiences of individuals with a life-limiting illness. We want to know how patients make sense of grief as it relates to their illness through the creation of legacy work, which is the process of creating something tangible that outlives oneself. Examples of legacy work include poems, audio-recordings, letters, short-stories, drawings, photographs, paintings, and music. We will be completing interviews (virtually or in person) to ask individuals about their experiences. You will receive a $25 gift card for participating in this study.

Women’s mental healthcare has mostly been based on research done on men, so we don’t fully understand how hormones affect women’s brains during menstruation, pregnancy, breastfeeding, and menopause. Also, our healthcare system focuses on medical treatments like medication and trying to change thoughts and emotions, instead of looking at ways to directly heal the brain and improve mental health. A key tool for improving mental healthcare is the Electroencephalogram (EEG). An EEG measures brain activity and helps find areas where the brain isn’t working properly, which can happen after emotional or physical trauma. While researchers in the US and Europe have created EEG databases, none focus on women. Our goal in this study is to conduct 800-1000 EEGs of women at different stages of life, to understand what a healthy female brain looks like during menstruation, pregnancy and menopause. We will analyze the EEG data and properties so we can discover what type of non-invasive therapy can help heal a woman's brain best at whatever stage in life she finds herself. This information is important for creating better mental health care choices for women in Alberta.

This study includes (one) survey to complete. The purpose of this research study is to understand women’s experiences of their mental health challenges and distresses throughout their lifetime, including: menopause, caregiver burden, grief and loss, common mental health problems, relationship challenges, family difficulties, cancer diagnosis and trauma. We also want to understand women’s experiences and preferences in seeking and obtaining mental health help.

Emotional health problems are the most common complication in pregnancy. However, in Canada, emotional health care is not part of routine prenatal care. As a result, only 1 in 10 pregnant Canadian women get help when they need it. 80% of women who develop postpartum depression or anxiety had symptoms when they were pregnant. But, usually they are not identified and helped. This study trials a model of perinatal care: screening, referral and 6 online CBT learning modules. We want to know if this type of care:  Reduces stress, depression, anxiety symptoms in pregnancy.  Improves infant health and development.  Reduces the risk of postpartum depression.

This study seeks to understand the meaning of healthcare experiences for people with problematic alcohol use. A researcher from the University of Calgary is interested in talking to people who self-identify as problematic alcohol drinkers and have had healthcare experiences that they would like to talk about. After a screening meeting to decide if participants are eligible, the researcher will conduct interviews over 1-2 hours with interested participants.

Rare, monogenic forms of systemic inflammatory rheumatic disease are increasingly recognized among patients diagnosed with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), autoinflammatory diseases (AIDs), systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis (sJIA) and vasculitis. These conditions often result from abnormalities within the innate and adaptive immune systems, with a large spectrum of clinical manifestations. Autoinflammatory diseases represent a group of monogenic disorders of which the fever syndromes including familial Mediterranean fever (FMF), tumour necrosis factor-receptor associated periodic syndrome (TRAPS), mevalonate kinase deficiency /hyper-immunoglobulin D syndrome (HIDS), and the cryopyrin associated periodic syndromes (CAPS) are the best-recognized. More recently vasculitis has also been recognized as a component of some monogenic autoinflammatory diseases. Without an accurate diagnosis, affected individuals may not be offered life-changing treatment. Furthermore, an early diagnosis is crucial to enable treatment initiation before irreversible organ damage occurs.

When a brain problem is identified in a baby before it's born (medical term: fetus), doctors try their best to predict how the brain problem will affect the fetus and their family using information from fetal brain pictures (magnetic resonance imaging; MRI). We don't have data to tell us how well doctors predict outcomes based on fetal MRI. Before we can study how predictions and outcomes line up, we have to know what families want to be predicted. We need families with experience with a fetal brain problem to tell us what they wanted or wished to know during the pregnancy.

This study is for children age between 6 months and 17 years who have chronic kidney disease and proteinuria to take part in a 6 months long clinical research study. The primary purpose of this clinical research study is to learn more about an investigational study medicine called finerenone. Individuals will be evaluated to determine their eligibility to participate in this study. Each patient who qualifies will receive the investigational medication, as well as study-related medical exams and study-related laboratory tests, at no cost. Compensation for time and travel may also, be available.

This study aims to improve brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) for children with severe disabilities, such as quadriplegic cerebral palsy (qCP). Currently, BCIs assist individuals in controlling things with their minds, but they are not as effective for children with disabilities who may have difficulty focusing their eyes. The study hypothesizes that by only using brain signals when the children are looking straight ahead, the BCIs may work better. To test this idea, we will involve ten children diagnosed with cerebral palsy and ten children with typical development aged 4 to 16. During the study, they will play a fun game while we measure their brain waves, eye movements, and record a video. We will compare the effectiveness of the BCI when focusing only on moments when the children are looking straight ahead versus not doing so. If our hypothesis proves correct, this improvement could significantly benefit these children, enabling them to perform more tasks independently.