Applied Psychiatric Epidemiology Across the Lifecourse

The APEAL Lab are delighted to be hosting Dr. Klara Mareckova at CHEO Mental Health Research Rounds next Tuesday, July 18, 12-1pm (Eastern). She will present on her research how prenatal stress influences brain structure and function. Please contact Dr. Colman at icolman@uottawa.ca for the Zoom link.

The APEAL Lab is interested in applications for two students interested in an MSc in Epidemiology starting in September, 2023.

Project #1: Interested in research about the mental health of gay men? Almost 2,000 gay men across Ontario completed a survey in 2015 that included questions about symptoms of depression and anxiety, substance use, history of abuse, risky sexual behaviours, and disclosure of sexual orientation. The student would be co-supervised by Dr. Ian Colman, director of the APEAL Lab, and Dr. Paul MacPherson, an infectious disease physician at the Ottawa Hospital who developed and administered the survey. Sexual minorities are encouraged to apply!

Project #2: Prevention in mental health is currently in its early stages, with increasing randomized controlled trials testing treatments to prevent mental disorders, but lack of data from the real world. Despite the lack of evidence, psychosis prevention services are widely implemented globally. We plan to develop a research line using evidence synthesis methods and simulated data to explore the benefit-risk ratio and health economics of services designed for the prevention of mental disorders. The student would be co-supervised by Dr. Ian Colman, director of the APEAL Lab, and Dr. Marco Solmi, a psychiatrist and epidemiologist at the Ottawa Hospital.

Interested applicants should contact Dr. Ian Colman at icolman@uottawa.ca, and send copies of their CV, transcripts (unofficial is fine), and a sample of their writing. Please also indicate if you have a preference for the research project.

Congratulations to APEAL lab members on a recent publication in the CMAJ examining disparities in suicidality risk between sexual minority and transgender youth and their cisgender, heterosexual peers. The APEAL team of Mila Kingsbury, Nicole Hammond, and Ian Colman worked in collaboration with Fae Johnstone of Wisdom2Action.org to produce this important paper. Fae and Ian spoke to the Globe and Mail about their work. Click here to read the original paper.

Congratulations to Danielle Lemaire, who presented a poster at the European Psychiatric Association Epidemiology Section meeting in Cambridge, U.K.

Dr. Colman gave a keynote address at the same meeting.

Congratulations to APEAL members Mila Kingsbury, Zahra Clayborne, and Ian Colman, who recently published a paper In collaboration with colleagues at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, the University of Oslo, and Oslo Metropolitan University. The paper examines predictors of relationship satisfaction across the transition to parenthood, and can be found here.

Congratulations to Dr. Zahra Clayborne, who successfully defended her PhD dissertation: “Biological and psychosocial influences on the associations between prenatal maternal stress and children’s mental health outcomes”. We know Dr. Clayborne will go on to great things!

Congratulations to APEAL PhD candidate Nicole Hammond, whose paper “Adverse childhood experiences and onset of migraine in Canadian adolescents: A cohort study” was recently published in Headache. The study found direct associations between experiencing adverse childhood events and migraine headache, but not non-migraine headache, in adolescence. These associations were not mediated by symptoms of depression or anxiety.

Way to go, Nicole!

Click here to read the paper