Maritime SPOR SUPPORT Unit

Strategy for Patient-Oriented Research (SPOR) Support for People and Patient-Oriented Research and Trials (SUPPORT) Units, or SPOR SUPPORT Units, are provincial and territorial-based centres that provide access to health data, apply knowledge generated through research to improve health care practices, provide training on conducting and using patient-oriented research, and engage patients as active partners throughout the entire research process.

The Maritime SPOR SUPPORT Unit is one of 11 hubs located across Canada that serve as centres of expertise in patient-oriented research. Since 2013, the Maritime SPOR SUPPORT Unit has played an important role building capacity in the region in patient-oriented research. On March 17, the Health Minister Jean Yves Duclos announced a new investment of $16.1M over five years in funding and in-kind contributions from the Government of Canada and the provincial governments of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island to support the work of a Maritime hub for patient-oriented research.

The funding includes:

• $7,327,630 from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research
• $3,636,255 from the Nova Scotia Department of Health and Wellness
• $2,500,000 from the New Brunswick Department of Health
• $1,900,000 from the New Brunswick Health Research Foundation
• An anticipated investment of up to $375,000 in funding from the Prince Edward Island Department of Health and Wellness
• An anticipated investment of up to $379,744 in in-kind contributions from the University of Prince Edward Island and the Prince Edward Island Department of Health and Wellness

This new investment will help the Maritime SPOR SUPPORT Unit continue this important work and bring it to the next level, ensuring patients have a greater say in setting research priorities, that they are involved in more aspects of the research process, and that the knowledge from research is applied to improve health care and patient outcomes.

Maritime SPOR SUPPORT Unit teams are located across the Maritimes, based at:

• The New Brunswick Institute for Research, Data and Training at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, NB
• The Centre de formation médicale du Nouveau-Brunswick at the Université de Moncton in Moncton, NB
• The Health Research Unit at the Saint John Regional Hospital, in Saint John, NB
• The Centre for Clinical Research, which is a part of Nova Scotia Health, and Health Data Nova Scotia, at Dalhousie University, in Halifax, NS
• The Centre for Health and Community Research at the University of Prince Edward Island, in Charlottetown, PEI