Our network investigator Dr. V. Thiruganasambandamoorthy speaks with CTV Morning Live about catching life-threatening conditions after fainting. Watch video: https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=1591577

Study reveals best ways to catch life-threatening conditions. For the first time, physicians in the Emergency Department (ED) have evidence-based recommendations on how best to catch the life-threatening conditions that make some people faint. New research published in Circulation suggests that low-risk patients can be safely sent home by a physician after spending two hours in the ED, and medium and high-risk patients can be sent home after six hours if no danger signals are detected. Most of the time fainting is harmless, but a small percentage of people faint due to serious medical conditions, such as an irregular heartbeat, or arrhythmia. These arrhythmias usually come and go quickly, and the person’s heart rhythm returns to normal by the time the ambulance arrives or they reach the ED. Fear of these arrhythmias coming back have led to patients being kept in the ED for eight to 12 hours. Approximately half of all patients who are hospitalized for fainting across Canada are admitted so their heart rhythm can be monitored. However, only a small proportion of patients will experience a dangerous irregular heartbeat, heart attack or death within a month of fainting. “Before this study we didn’t know which fainting patients...

Pam Husband has spent 23 tireless years giving a voice to patients and families affected by inherited cardiac rhythm disorders, which often lead to sudden cardiac death. She is the Executive Director of the Canadian Sudden Arrhythmia Death Syndromes (SADS) Foundation, Canada’s only SADS-specific patient advocacy group. The registered Canadian charity works with patients and medical professionals to raise awareness about the warning signs of SADS. An estimated 700 children and young people die from a SADS condition each year in Canada – early diagnosis and proper treatment help patients lead productive lives. “CANet has been very helpful by including and inviting us to their meetings and conferences,” Husband says. As a patient-information group, SADS gets to talk to other physicians about SADS, and create opportunities to reach out to their patients. For years, the organization has brought patients and healthcare professionals closer together through their website, social media, and importantly, their SADS conferences, held across Canada, “It is critical to bring patient voices forward, understand their experiences, and improve their healthcare experience,” Husband says. In her eyes, patients are not only recipients of healthcare, but also its participants. Earlier, Husband explains, the physician was the expert, and the patient...

“The impact of sudden cardiac death is second only to all cancers in terms of life-years lost,” says CANet investigator and professor at University of British Columbia’s Faculty of Medicine, Dr. Andrew Krahn. He, together with fellow CANet investigator and professor at University of Toronto’s Faculty of Medicine, Dr. Robert Hamilton, is helping better diagnose and treat individuals and family members at-risk for sudden cardiac death by developing a more effective detection and prevention strategy. The strategy, according to them, is in the genes. The program focuses explicitly on channelopathies, and hypertrophic and arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathies – all predominant causes of SCD in young adults and children. Each of these disorders is an inherited heart condition. “Our current system typically discovers barely ten per cent or less of these individuals,” Dr. Krahn says. Krahn and Hamilton have received funding with CANet’s Strategic Research Grant for their project “The Canadian Genetic Heart Rhythm Network: Innovative Strategies to Reduce the Risk of Sudden Cardiac Death Using Novel Clinical and Population Approaches” The Canadian Genetic Heart Rhythm Network is a collection of 15 centers – 12 adult and seven pediatric – across seven provinces in Canada. Patients will work with genetic counselors and cardiac...

“It bothers me when I cannot answer a question,” Dr. Paul Dorian says. A few years ago, a patient, having survived a sudden cardiac arrest asked Dorian if there were other survivors out there like him. Dorian didn’t know the answer. Now, the University of Toronto Medicine professor, along with a group of researchers – all part of the Canadian Resuscitation Outcomes Consortium (CanROC) – has teamed up with CANet to search for answers. The Canadian Sudden Cardiac Arrest Network Registry (C-SCAN) will be the country’s first comprehensive database of sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) cases. “We have no idea how many people in Canada get cardiac arrests,” Dorian says. “Is the number going up or down? How many survive? What’s their average age? Does it affect more men or women? We simply don’t know.” CANet’s role will go beyond tallying numbers and the details of age and sex. “With CANet’s help, we will have an idea of patients’ health conditions before and after they suffered from SCA,” Dorian says. He and his team will get to know the patient’s medical history; what happened in the minutes, hours, and days leading up to a SCA? Did they, for example, have a...

Sudden Cardiac Death (SCD) happens when the heart unexpectedly stops working. SCD is usually caused by an abnormal heart rhythm (arrhythmia). When a person experiences SCD, he or she collapses, is unresponsive to touch or sound and usually stops breathing. SCD victims will die if they don’t receive emergency medical help. An Automated External Defibrillator (AED) must be used to restart the heart. Up to 40,000 cardiac arrests happen in Canada each year. Your heart has a natural pacemaker, called the sinus node, which creates electrical impulses that cause your heart to beat. When there is a disorder in this electrical system, an arrhythmia may occur. Click here to view ‘On Track: Sudden Cardiac Death’

On December 6, 2018, Minister of Science Kirsty Duncan announced that the funding for the Networks of Centres of Excellence (NCE) program would be gradually transferred to the New Frontiers in Research Fund over the next several years. The Fund, valued at $275 million over five years and $65 million per year after that, will focus on exploratory, multidisciplinary and international research and will be open to researchers and networks of researchers across all disciplines. Currently-funded networks including ours will continue to be funded until the end date of their grant. The NCE has invited us to apply for a final three-year grant which will begin after the end of our five-year term. Built upon a strong foundation of on-going successes in our community, CANet is poised to be competitive in this renewal application. What this means to our research community is that our current CANet-funded projects will continue and our renewal grant funding opportunities is active, with extended application deadlines. With our impacts and successes, we have become a well-recognized organization, and we are well-positioned to continue our growth and be self-sustained. Recently, we have been chosen to advance to the (full application) final stage for the Innovation, Science...

Our Path to Renewal In preparation for our 2020-2025 Network renewal, we have launched the following grant funding opportunities. For additional details, guides and required application forms, please click on the links below each description.   Strategic Research Grant (SRG) Deadline Extended to January 28, 2019 The Strategic Research Grant (SRG) program is intended to support small and large-scale multidisciplinary multi-sectoral research projects that are presented in the context of a program of research that is aligned with the strategic priorities of the network. The purpose of the Full Application (FA) is to fully articulate your desire to pursue an area of research that is aligned with the vision of the Network and to allow reviewers to identify whether your request fits the criteria intended for this competition (see below for specific criteria). The Full Application will be due on Monday, January 14, 2019, with notice of awards by November 2019. https://canetinc.ca/research   Major Industry-Partnered Research Grant (MIRG) Deadline Extended to January 28, 2019 The Major Industry-Partnered Research Grant (MIRG) program is designed to support new transdisciplinary research Projects which are primarily industry focused and that are aligned with the Network’s strategic priorities. Up to $200,000 per year for three years is available for projects that...

Dr. Ratika Parkash is getting closer to 120,000 patients across Canada. Parkash’s work is aimed at patients who live with pacemakers or implantable defibrillators – both, cardiac implantable electronic devices or CIEDs. Pacemakers help control abnormal heart rhythm. Implantable defibrillators deliver life-saving shocks to patients who are at risk of irregular and potentially fatal heart rhythms. “We want to deliver more efficient pacemaker and implantable cardiac device care across Canada, virtually eliminating in-clinic visits for most patients,” Parkash says. CIEDs, like any other devices, need regular maintenance in order to function properly and detect atrial fibrillation and ventricular arrhythmia more effectively. Patients often visit specialized device clinics at least twice a year, sometimes more frequently. For 19 per cent of Canadians living in rural communities, they have to travel long distances to reach these clinics and healthcare facilities. Dr. Paul MacDonald, a cardiologist at Cape Breton Regional Hospital says, “We are over 400 km away from the teaching centre where these devices are implanted. If they do need to be checked or monitored, it can mean, for example, a five-hour drive, or an overnight stay. Often patients’ families have to go, or patients are admitted to hospital and require ambulance...

At the heart of CANet’s quest to combat sudden cardiac death lies a few millimeters of cardiac muscle. For Dr. Jamie Manlucu, it will be enough. With CANet’s help, she is refining a groundbreaking technology that may give 40 per cent of Canadians suffering from advanced heart failure a second lease of life. The project is a crucial step towards CANet’s strategic goal to reduce sudden cardiac death cases in Canada by 10 per cent. Manlucu, a CANet Early Career Investigator, and professor at the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, recently received CANet’s Major Industry-Partnered Research Grant totaling $400,000, for her project, ‘Resynchronization For Ambulatory Heart Failure Trial – LV Endocardial Approach (RAFT-LVendo)’ . Advanced heart failure often results from impaired electrical activation of cardiac muscles. In the conventional approach – Cardiac Resynchronization Therapy (CRT) – doctors place pacemaker wires at specific areas of the heart to deliver precisely timed electric shocks that restore normal cardiac rhythm. CRT has been a success story for patients with acute heart abnormalities. For those with less severe cases – who count among Canada’s most vulnerable populations at risk for ventricular arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death – it has not worked. Enter LVendocardial...