Success in the Faculty of Health Sciences is measured by the impact we have on the lives we touch. Whether training medical students to be compassionate doctors, supporting nurse scientists charting paths for better patient care or providing rehabilitation therapists with cutting-edge resources, the achievements of our students, faculty and researchers are evident in the ways they make a difference in the lives of so many.
Our three schools — School of Medicine, School of Nursing and School of Rehabilitation Therapy — share one vision: ask questions, seek answers, advance care and inspire change. With your support we can do just that, improving the health and well being of people across the country.
Faculty of Health Sciences Goal: $50,000,000
Highlighted Priorities
–Chairs - $50,000,000
- Rehabilitation Science
- Nursing Science
- Medicine
- Biomedical and Molecular Sciences
Rehabilitation Science: More people than ever before are recognizing the important role rehabilitation therapists and scientists play, not only in individual health, but also in global health and community development. Our school’s enrolment reflects this. As of 2008, we have enrolled 46 new students each year. Today, 140 students from an applicant pool of 1,400 earn coveted positions in occupational and physical therapy programs, and another 30 are completing graduate degrees.
But while our student body has grown 55% over the last four years, our faculty component has remained steady. To help meet our growing demand and to offer our exceptional program, we must secure faculty leadership. Endowed chairs in human motor performance and community disability and wellness will help the school attract two internationally recognized scholars, expand research and graduate studies, and help maintain our small group learning experience.
Nursing Science: Canada’s aging population is fuelling the demand for nurses who combine expert bedside skills with the research know-how that leads to improved models of care. Queen’s School of Nursing, with our innovative approach to graduate nursing education, is one of the fastest growing schools of its kind in the country and our graduates are in high demand. In a time of growth, while our school responds to the increased demand for registered nurses, and the complex and evolving needs of our healthcare system, we require endowed research chairs to secure the critical leadership for the school’s research and graduate programs.
Family Medicine: Queen’s Department of Family Medicine is delivering the future of primary healthcare and is poised to become a centre of excellence for primary health-care delivery, innovative education and as a catalyst for collaboration among health professionals in research, health programming and medical education. To realize this goal, we must attract the clinician scholars who are recognized leaders in these areas and can integrate our postgraduate and medical training programs, our research in the Centre for Primary Care and our patient clinics.
Biomedical and Molecular Sciences: Queen’s Department of Biomedical and Molecular Sciences is a showcase of the University’s new blended learning approach, acting as a hub of knowledge and discovery. We educate thousands of students across the undergraduate life sciences and biochemistry programs, in the schools of medicine, nursing and rehabilitation therapy programs, and in graduate science programs. Our research spans the disciplines and complements clinical research into countless diseases and conditions. Our vision for science education is one that engages students independently and in teams, as communicators and as critical and creative thinkers. To realize this, we will establish a rotating Chair in Teaching and Learning that will attract a series of leading scientific researchers with an interest in new models of learning. The chair will lead the department’s shift from didactic to interactive learning, inspiring and measuring new practices in the classroom and laboratories.
–Combined MD/PHD Program - $3,000,000
As part of our commitment to excellence across research, education and training, we are creating an MD/PhD program leading to both a medical degree and a PhD in science that will graduate doctors with a unique combination of skills to bring clinical perspectives to lab work, and science perspectives to clinical practice.
Earning a MD/PhD demands hard work, dedication, motivation, innovation – and good financial planning and support. With the establishment of our program, we have a plan to attract the best MD/PhD students from across Canada and support them throughout their studies. We will create 12 scholarships to support them throughout the medical training portion of their MD/PhD degree. Valued at $25,000 a year and renewable, each scholarship will complement the minimum $18,000 annual stipend awarded to doctoral candidates engaged in active research with a faculty supervisor.
These endowed scholarships will help recruit and retain students, allow them to focus on their education without the need for loans or part-time work, and reduce debt load at graduation so they can choose a residency based on skill and interest, not earning power.
–School of Rehabilitation Therapy Facilities - $5,000,000
Our rehabilitation Therapy student body has grown substantially in the last five years – indication of Queen’s reputation and the growing need for skilled rehabilitation and occupational therapists. More students, increased focus on research and evolving learning models are placing unprecedented demands on the school’s 51-year-old Louise D. Acton Building.
Queen’s is committed to providing the exceptional spaces and learning resources that our students need to prepare for their careers and to participate in rehabilitation research. A new, state-of-the-art home for our school will be built to enable small-group learning, provide large, multi-purpose spaces for hands-on skills development, offer simulated patient learning, and have dedicated research space. Students will learn together and from each other, using the latest equipment and best practices.
–Canadian Institute for Military and Veteran’s Health Research - $2,500,000
Thinking and research about the unique health issues faced by military personnel has changed and evolved dramatically in the last decades – and has become all the more necessary with Canada’s engagement in Afghanistan and other recent missions. These Canadians have made exceptional personal sacrifices, yet Canada is alone among its major allies in not having a national research program dedicated to the particular needs of its military community.
That’s why we are creating the Canadian Institute for Military and Veteran’s Health Research (CIMVHR) at Queen’s. Our goal will be to maximize the health and well-being of Canadian military personnel, veterans and their families.
Queen’s leads researchers from more than 20 Canadian universities to develop a coordinated approach to research and knowledge transfer. Their work will transform practise and make a significant difference to the care of Canada’s more than 700,000 veterans and the more than 100,000 serving military personnel and their families.
–Human Mobility Research Centre Endowment Fund - $3,000,000
Queen’s research environment is built around helping our academic doctors work in an environment of cross-pollination and collaboration. The Human Mobility Research Centre (HMRC) is one of our best examples of how this approach helps address some of the world’s most pressing health issues. The Centre’s goal of finding new treatments for mobility-related disorders such as arthritis and osteoporosis draws on the work of orthopaedic surgeons, computer scientists, rehabilitation specialists and biomedical engineers. They work hand-in-hand as teachers, researchers and pioneers of effective new treatments.
An endowment fund dedicated to the HMRC would help Queen’s attract and support the clinicians who can make a difference; nurture the culture of collaboration so critical to developing new models of research, teaching and practice; and strengthen Queen’s reputation as a research institution committed to clinical science and patient care.
