Supporting top talent in Montreal

This week on Health Matters, guest host Kelly Albert speaks with Dr. Dana Small about learning how our brains impact our overall health. Abigail Sousa discusses the Courtois Cardiovascular Signature Program and their Run for a Reason team. Dr. Anthony Zeitouni shares the importance of a cochlear implant clinic and the advances in cochlear implant research at the MUHC. And, Shawniya Alageswaran describes the significance of winning the Fiera Capital Awards for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Health Care.

Cette semaine à Questions de santé, l’animatrice invitée Kelly Albert discute avec la Dre Dana Small de ses études sur l’impact du cerveau sur la santé globale. Abigail Sousa parle du programme signature Courtois pour les maladies cardiovasculaires et de son équipe qui participe au défi Courir pour la cause. Le Dr Anthony Zeitouni explique l’importance d’une clinique d’implants cochléaires et les percées de la recherche sur les implants cochléaires au CUSM. Enfin, Shawniya Alageswaran décrit à quel point le fait d’avoir gagné un Prix Fiera Capital pour la diversité, l’équité et l’inclusion dans les soins de santé est important pour elle.

Transcript

Kelly Albert: 0:00

Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us. Tarah Schwartz is off this week. I'm Kelly Albert and this is Health Matters on CJAD 800. On today's show, a cochlear implant can have a life changing impact on a patient who's hard of hearing, we speak with the Director of the Cochlear Implant Research Program about how a new centre at the MUHC will help give better access to care for patients. And later in the show, we hear from a first year PhD student who shares how the Fiera Capital Awards for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion will help her pursue innovative research in neuroscience. To begin today, the brain is a fascinating organ and there are numerous researchers who are working to better understand and map out how the brain affects our health. The McGill University Health Centre is thrilled to have a rising star returned to Montreal to join our ranks. Dr. Dana Small is a professor at Yale University with graduate degrees in neuroscience and clinical psychology from McGill University. She will be joining our team very soon and she will bring her research into the brain and obesity here to Montreal to continue at the MUHC. Dr. Small, thank you for joining us.

Dr. Dana Small: 1:05

Sure, my pleasure.

Kelly Albert: 1:06

So you have been at Yale for several years. Now, what brings you back to the MUHC?

Dr. Dana Small: 1:13

Actually, I've been at Yale for 20 years. So it's been a long time. And it's been it's been great here. But I guess it was about a year ago, I hadn't been thinking of leaving Yale. But I was offered the directorship of a Max Planck Institute in Germany and these are amazing positions. I actually considered maybe I could leave Yale. And one of the reasons why they're such a great position is that they provide a lot of funding, so that you can really establish an ambitious and creative research program. And so I was going to say yes. One of the things that I had started to do in preparation for my move was to create a vision statement about the neuro-imaging core that I would create. And I found my myself as I was writing this thinking about, not Yale, despite the fact that I'd been here for 20 years. But rather the McConnell brain imaging center at the Montreal Neurological Institute where I trained. It's just because it was such a fabulous training experience with just really wonderful scientists that I still collaborate with today. So in essence, I was trying to recreate what I had trained with, because I just thought that was the best, the best possible way to set up a centre. I was actually in Munich, about to meet with the president of the Max Planck group. And the night before, I received the call from Dr. Lesley Fellows at McGill. She informed me that they had selected me as the CERC candidate. So this is the Canadian Excellence Research Chairs program, which is also a very generous program. There's enough funds to do ambitious and creative science. It was one of those things where when she said it, I just knew it was right. And part of that was because I had just been thinking about this vision of the neuro-imaging core that I would create. And then all of a sudden, there was this possibility of not needing to recreate it, but actually getting to go back to the real deal. And begin work again, more closely with the colleagues that I hold in such high esteem.

Kelly Albert: 3:36

That's really inspiring. We're in conversation with Dr. Dana Small, who is currently a professor at Yale University; will be coming back to the McGill universe, the McGill network, and the MUHC. And I love that you're going to be really kind of building upon the foundation that was so instrumental in your own training, in your own career. So let's get into what you do. Tell our listeners a little bit about the research that you're working on.

Dr. Dana Small: 4:02

Sure. Fundamentally, I'm a neuroscientist. I'm interested in the neural circuits that are important for regulating the decisions about what people eat. So why people eat what it is that they do. I'm also interested in understanding the effects of food on the brain, both positive and negative. So for example, one of the negatives is that there's a relationship between diet-induced obesity and diabetes, with Alzheimer's disease. People who have obesity or who have metabolic dysfunction are much more likely to develop Alzheimer's disease later in life. Sometimes like two or three times as likely. So we're really interested in trying to understand the links and understand the process by which that's happening. So that we can obviously mitigate it and turn that around, or establish new therapy. But I'm also interested in trying to understand just the basic circuits that support human decision-making. And eating is such an... it's an old, necessary behavior. All organisms need to acquire energy to sustain life. And so I think that the circuits evolved for this are some of the most fundamental circuits in the brain. And, in fact, probably even played a role in propelling organisms to develop the brain. And so there's a lot of hidden secrets and circuits for trying to understand higher order behaviors like decision-making.

Kelly Albert: 5:49

That's really interesting, because I think... I said it off the top, the brain is super fascinating. And I think it's one of the organs where I feel it has the most potential to understand or unlock, or discover how these relationships work, how these circuits connect. Do you find that in your career so far, you've seen vast changes or vast evolutions of how we understand the brain?

Dr. Dana Small: 6:14

Yeah, definitely, it's often we think about the last 10 years as like the golden era of neuroscience. Because there's been the development of so many amazing techniques. But in my field, actually, one of the biggest discoveries that my team has been involved with is the discovery that the brain doesn't work in isolation. So there's the whole, we say, the gut brain access. So there's all of the processes in the body, that are constantly sending information to the brain. It's unconscious, but it's really important for regulating behavior. And so this idea that our stomach things and our intestine can control the brain is a new one. And it's interesting, because it provides sort of a new framework for understanding behavior, and in particular, in justice behavior. So understanding why people select the foods that they do.

Kelly Albert: 7:20

In conversation with Dr. Dana Small, a professor at Yale University, she has a graduate degree in neuroscience and clinical psychology from McGill University, she will be coming back to Montreal to join the MUHC. I like what you just said there too. In hoping to kind of discover how everything communicates with one another in the body, is that what you really want to focus on in terms of how people gravitate to what they eat? Or the relationship that the brain in the body has in kind of asking for that food or craving that food even maybe?

Dr. Dana Small: 7:53

Exactly, and in fact, it was an important aspect of the McGill offer is that there's this initiative to try to integrate neuroscience and metabolism. Traditionally, these fields have progressed in parallel. But obviously, the new science is saying the highly interactive and that interaction is super important. Even for things like cognitive neuroscience. The idea of integrating the fields and trying to understand and train people to understand how they interact, I think is really important, and is at the forefront of the next major discoveries.

Kelly Albert: 8:36

We talk a lot about big dreams at the MUHC Foundation? Would that be your big dream to getting closer to understanding those relationships? Or completely understanding them?

Dr. Dana Small: 8:50

It's interesting, because I'm interested in how the circuit works at a basic level. But I also believe that this circuit is critical for understanding the obesity epidemic. And that is because the obesity epidemic is related to the food environment and the changes in the food environment. And so I would really like to understand better, how gut brain circuits interact with the environment to promote overeating, and metabolic dysfunction so that we can understand how to better create healthier foods. So I think one of the things that needs to be done, because this is such an area, is to bring together scientists and academics with governments and industry so that we can begin actually trying to change the food environment. By creating and doing science that can inform healthier food production, but also better food policy because it's really the food environment that needs to change in order to curb the obesity epidemic.

Kelly Albert: 9:59

I wish we had had more time. Unfortunately, Dr. Small, we're out of time, but we will have you back on the show because I think your research is incredibly fascinating. And there's so much more that we can discuss with regards to it. Thank you so much.

Dr. Dana Small: 10:11

My pleasure. Thank you.

Kelly Albert: 10:12

That is Dr. Dana Small, a professor at Yale University with graduate degrees in neuroscience and clinical psychology from McGill University. Coming up on Health Matters lacing up your sneakers for good cause. Tarah Schwartz is off this week. I'm Kelly Albert, welcome back to Health Matters on CJAD 800. The MUHC foundation is an official charity partner of the 21k de Montreal for the eighth year, you can participate by racing in either a five kilometer, 10 kilometer, or 21 kilometer race or walk at Parc Jean Drapeau on April 22. We call it Run for a Reason because we have several teams at the MUHC and the Research Institute of the MUHC who are participating and fundraising for special projects or programs that are close to their heart. Abigail Sousa is the research coordinator for the Courtois Cardiovascular Signature Program, she is participating in Run for a Reason for the second time this year. Abigail, thank you so much for joining us.

Abigail Sousa: 11:09

Thank you so much for having me.

Kelly Albert: 11:10

Tell me- this is your second year participating in Run for a Reason. What inspired you from the first year to come back?

Abigail Sousa: 11:17

I found it very fun last year. It's a fun environment. And it just makes you feel accomplished. Like just passing that finish line really makes you feel good. And it's for a good cause. It's to build awareness. So, of course, I was going to do it for a second year.

Kelly Albert: 11:32

That's wonderful. And so which race are you doing this year?

Abigail Sousa: 11:36

I'm not sure yet. I walked and ran a little bit, the five kilometer. And I discovered that I really liked it. So after that, I continued training. And I ran actually two times more five kilometer runs. So hopefully I'm aiming for the 10 kilometer this year, but we'll see where I'm at with my training.

Kelly Albert: 11:58

Amazing. That's really incredible. That's what I like about this event, too. There's no pressure to absolutely run or absolutely walk you can kind of do it at your own pace.

Abigail Sousa: 12:08

Yeah, exactly. I really liked it.

Kelly Albert: 12:11

We are in conversation with Abigail Sousa, who is the research coordinator for the Courtois Cardiovascular Signature program. We've talked about the Courtois program a little bit on the show before but why don't you tell me from your perspective, what this program is and how it helps people.

Abigail Sousa: 12:26

Of course, so it's a program that helps us better understand the factors that can affect someone's health. And it also helps us understand the origin and biology of cardiovascular disease. We want to find new ways to detect treat and maybe prevent or cure health problems. We're very happy to be the first biobank of its kind in the world that collects this many variables across a long period of time. Anyone between the ages of like 35 and 79 years old, can participate if they meet the criteria. And now we're focusing on recruiting people with cardiovascular disease, or who have been diagnosed with hypertension, high cholesterol or diabetes. We're also looking to diversify our population and want to look at different ethnic groups that are not from the European descent.

Kelly Albert: 13:17

That's really important, because we've spoken about this on the show how a lot of the studies that are done are on one specific group, generally men, generally Caucasian men. I appreciate that this program is reaching out to diverse groups and diverse people to try and bring them into this research and incorporate their conditions into the research.

Abigail Sousa: 13:40

Exactly. That's really our goal, we want to really look at everyone. It doesn't matter if it's a male or a female, different age groups too. We really just want to understand why people that seem healthy and develop heart disease, and maybe others don't. So we really want to look at everyone, everything, all the factors. And it's really just to help us understand the cardiovascular disease. Also, hopefully, in the future, prevent, or cure it.

Kelly Albert: 14:08

I like that, too. I think one of the really interesting things about the Courtois cardiovascular signature program is that it is a longer program that you study patients for quite a while. But your data, your information about your health can help change the future. You can help save lives because of what you're doing and participating in. Does that inspire you to know that what you're participating in what you work for will make a difference in the years to come in terms of research into cardiovascular illnesses and why people have heart issues?

Abigail Sousa: 14:41

For sure, where we're at today is all things to research that was done in the past. So I think it's a great way to actually advance this type of research advance our knowledge. For me, it's super inspiring, just working with an amazing team and getting to know a bit more about it. So I'm very thankful and it is very inspiring.

Kelly Albert: 15:07

In conversation with Abigail Sousa, who is the research coordinator for the Courtois Cardiovascular Signature Program, she is participating in Run for a Reason this year, which is a charity fundraising run walk event, you can run five kilometers, 10 kilometers, or 21 kilometers. It's an in-person event at Parc Jean Drapeau. And your team fundraises for a cause that's close to your heart, something that really impacts you, that you believe in. Abigail, obviously, your work is focused on the Courtois Signature Program. But why was it important for you to give back to the program?

Abigail Sousa: 15:45

For sure, it's to raise funds to help us better understand cardiovascular disease. We want to continue to do this program for many years to come and to be able to change lives in the future. So participating will encourage others to maybe also participate. Either they walk or they run. And it brings awareness to this program and brings more people to join. And for us to really get this program known and for everyone to know about it.

Kelly Albert: 16:16

Because how many patients are you still recruiting for? How many more patients do you need?

Abigail Sousa: 16:21

Our goal is 4000 participants and right now we have over 2300. So we have a little bit less than half to go. But now we're really more focusing on that group that I mentioned before, that do have the cardiovascular disease, are diagnosed with hypertension, high cholesterol or diabetes.

Kelly Albert: 16:41

And so if someone is listening right now and is interested in participating in the signature program, how would they get in touch with you?

Abigail Sousa: 16:50

So they can go on our website, it's CVsignature.ca. You can press on the 'participate' tab and you enter a couple of questions. If the questions are answered with the criteria that we're looking for, there's a button to be able to book yourself in for a zoom call. It's an informative zoom. So we'll do the presentation, we'll answer questions if you have. And then we show the process on how to sign the consent form and get started with your participation.

Kelly Albert: 17:21

Incredible. In conversation with Abigail Sousa, the research coordinator for the Courtois Cardiovascular Signature program. As she mentioned, if you're interested in participating, CVsignature.ca, is the way to find out about the Courtois Signature Program and if you meet the criteria, if you'd like to participate in and really make a difference in the future of health care by participating in the study and learning more about your health and also informing the health of patients for years to come. You're fundraising with Run for a Reason for the Courtois Cardiovascular Program. You were participating last year you're participating again this year and Run for a Reason. For those who don't know what Run for Reason is like, can you tell us a little bit about what your experience was? Describe the atmosphere. Describe what it's like to participate in the race.

Abigail Sousa: 18:10

Of course, so last year was actually my first running event ever. So when you get to Parc Jean-Drapeau, we went by public transport. There's just a bunch of people, everyone's happy, everyone's kind of warming up. And there's music going on. There's different teams, people have different shirts of what they're also raising funds for. They asked us to get in line, then they tell us to go and then we go. We can run we can walk and just being around people that are doing the same thing as you and everyone's happy. It feels great. And like I mentioned, you feel accomplished after going through that finish line. They mentioned your name, and you just feel happy. It's a very good event. And I feel like even if you're walking, you know, you'll have to be a professional. Even if you're walking, it'll make you feel good. So it makes you feel like you're making a change even in the smallest little way.

Kelly Albert: 19:05

And you're with a team of participants. You don't have to do it alone. You can absolutely do it alone if you want to. You're with a whole team of people who can cheer you on and who you can cheer on, right?

Abigail Sousa: 19:14

Yeah, exactly.

Kelly Albert: 19:16

That's really great. Well, Abigail, thank you so much for joining us on the show. I wish you all the success with the race, I hope you are able to fundraise a lot of money and I'll check up to see if you're going to do that 10k after all. I think it's exciting that you want to challenge yourself and try a little bit harder. So thank you so much for joining us.

Abigail Sousa: 19:34

Thank you so much for having me.

Kelly Albert: 19:35

That is Abigail Sousa. She is the research coordinator for the Courtois Cardiovascular Signature Program. She is participating in Run for Reason. If you would like to know more about run for a reason, or maybe even create a team and fundraise for something special at the MUHC Foundation. You can go to our website, MUHCFoundation.com. We have all of the information there about when the race is how you can start a team which programs you can fundraise for and we're here to help you understand that all at MUHCFoundation.com. Coming up next on Health Matters, providing patients with cochlear implants in Montreal the best possible care closer to home. Tarah Schwartz is off this week. I'm Kelly Albert and this is Health Matters. On January 13, 2023, that MUHC performed its first cochlear implant surgery at the Glen site. Previously, patients had to travel to Quebec City to receive the surgery and all of the associated care that comes with it. It was an exciting step to offer patients living here in Montreal, the possibility of better access to really excellent care right here in their hometown. That MUHC Foundation is proud to have funded the cochlear implant research at the MUHC and is excited to offer its continued support for this amazing program. Dr. Anthony Zeitouni is a head and neck surgeon at MUHC. He is also the Director of the Cochlear Implant Research Program and joins me now. Hi Dr. Zeitouni.

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 20:55

Hi, thank you for having me on the show. How are you?

Kelly Albert: 20:57

I'm well. How are you?

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 20:59

I'm very good. Thanks.

Kelly Albert: 21:00

So tell me about this second cochlear implant clinic in the province right here in Montreal. How special is it to have this right here?

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 21:10

This is a really exciting time for everyone in Montreal who has been working so hard for decades to get this program. A cochlear implant is a very routine way around the world to help children and adults who are deaf regain hearing. It's been done in many, many places. In fact, Montreal is probably the only large city of our size, not to have a program. Nowhere in North America, elsewhere, nowhere in Europe that we're in Asia or Africa, that a city like us not have a cochlear implant program. So you can understand Montreal, with all our great research facilities and all our population and their needs. It was so awkward and unthinkable that we didn't have a program. And now we do. It's really exciting. And I really want to thank the MUHC Foundation, but also all my colleagues, all the different universities in Montreal and around the province who fought for this so hard. It's really great to see it happen finally.

Kelly Albert: 22:15

I think it's important that it's here in Montreal too. Because when I was reading about cochlear implant surgeries, there's quite a bit of associated care that comes with it. So that would mean for someone living here in Montreal, routine back and forth travel up to Quebec City, which is cost-prohibitive and limiting for a lot of people.

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 22:35

Exactly, it was more expensive for the province to fund this. And it was so difficult for parents of deaf children. If they had one or two or three kids and they had to take one to Quebec City back and forth, it was just very difficult to arrange. And then to take care of the other kids who also had needs and the same thing for adults who worked and had lives and families to go back and forth. It was just very, very awkward.

Kelly Albert: 23:00

In conversation with Dr. Anthony Zeitouni, the Director of the McGill Cochlear Implant Research Program. So Dr. Zeitouni, tell me a little bit about this research program. What do you look into with this research program?

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 23:12

About 10 years ago, we felt that although we didn't have a clinical program where we saw patients and implanted them; there were many important research questions to be asked. We wanted to improve cochlear implants, which were being done around the world, and make them work even more effectively for patients. This is a really incredible technology. For the first time in history, we have the ability to give humans back a sense that they've lost. We still can't fix vision; we still can't fix the other senses. But hearing, we can restore. So this is a super interesting technology, but wasn't perfect. Of course, we wanted to improve it even further. And we felt that we had the resources here in Montreal to do that. There's a lot of linguistic research, a lot of basic research going into understanding how the brain works. We thought we could put all that together and bring people together from different fields to do that. So that's what we did. We brought a number of researchers, senior researchers. We hired a very young researcher who ended up being awesome lead for this, Alexandre Lehmann, and together we started this program. We've been pretty much on the map of cochlear implant research around the world. And we've really understood a lot more of its factors that can make us understand how these devices work and how to make them work better. So we've got the interest not only of the research community, but we've got even different companies started to look at our research and get interested in what we were doing.

Kelly Albert: 24:47

I imagine there's a lot of different variables that happen once you have this surgery to restore your hearing. I imagine patients react differently to once they have that hearing back and how they understand it. Would that be one of the ways you research?

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 25:05

What we noticed early on, is that patients who seem to be very similar, had very different outcomes. Some would do really well with the device and some would become really awesome stars. So we asked the question, why is there such a difference to take two patients with the same history? Essentially, the cochlea, their inner ear looks the same, their hearing tests and everything shows that they're equally deaf. And then we do the implant surgery, it goes well, for both patients. And one does really well and the other one does even better. Or one does it well enough, but there were some stars. We want to understand why is there a difference between the star patients and other patients who just had a good result, but maybe not as well as we had hoped. We're trying to understand that. We're also trying to understand how we can make other important variables of hearing restoration better for the patients. For example, we noticed that music, some people that hear music through the implant, of course, but they didn't enjoy as much as before. So we wanted to understand that better, and see what we could do to make the implants better at not only understanding speech, but music enjoyment. We want to make sure that, for example, we can also make patients able to understand emotions in speech better. There's such a big difference is intonation, and the implants, we're not always carrying that information. So we want to understand that better, and see how we could perfect that.

Kelly Albert: 26:47

In conversation with Dr. Anthony Zeitouni, the Director of the McGill Cochlear Implant Research Program. It must be so rewarding to work with patients who've just had their hearing restored. Can you tell me a little bit about what that's like?

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 27:03

It's a great experience. I mean, I remember first seeing it when I was a younger, I'd done my residency, I was in fellowship in New York. And we were watching a patient who had the surgery, she was in a room with a mirror, and she just gotten her cochlear implant turned on. And she could hear sounds for the first time and her eyes widened. And she was so excited, so happy to be able to do that. Like a child who had never heard anything before, and all of a sudden, she could hear things. And adults who have lost their hearing. And felt that they would always be deaf. They've had the surgery. And then usually a few weeks after the surgery that we turn on the device, they'd come in, and they could hear again, and they were so grateful, so happy. So excited as you can hear their families, hear their children again, and participate in the wider community.

Kelly Albert: 28:02

And it must be even more special to know that you're helping to fine tune it; to make it that much better for them.

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 28:10

Yeah, I mean, it's been a procedure that's routinely done around the world now for several decades. But every year the technology gets better and better. The strategies, the computer uses that little processor that they wear. It's gets better every year, and we want to contribute and continue to contribute to produce improvement.

Kelly Albert: 28:32

And so, you mentioned that the MUHC Foundation has helped the research, continue and help develop this program and encourage researchers to join the program as well. So in your eyes, how does philanthropy like this help advance a program like the Cochlear Implant Research Program?

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 28:52

We're very indebted to philanthropy for this, when we had the idea of starting to research and making Montreal more prominent in the world of cochlear implants, and use that in fact, as a tool to lobby the government for a clinical program. Without the philanthropy, without their support of private foundations, we've never been able to do this. They believed in us. They believed in Montreal and our ability to bring research from different organizations and bring researchers together. And the Hospital Foundation did the same. They believed in us really, this was not a clinical program we had at MUHC. But they understood that this was important to them to Montrealers, important to our patients. And both philanthropy and the Foundation supported us and it took a while but we finally got to a clinical program.

Kelly Albert: 29:47

Well, we are for sure, very grateful for dedicated researchers and doctors like yourself who push the boundaries to make sure that we have excellent care here in our city. Dr. Zeitouni, thank you so much for your time today.

Dr. Anthony Zeitouni: 29:59

Thank you for Hear me on the show.

Kelly Albert: 30:01

That is Dr. Anthony Zeitouni, a head and neck surgeon at the MUHC and the Director of the McGill Cochlear Implant Research Program. Coming up next on Health Matters, we speak with the winner of an award to help researchers from underrepresented groups thrive. Tarah Schwartz is off this week. I'm Kelly Albert, and you're listening to Health Matters. In Health and Medical Research, like many fields, there are groups that are underrepresented. And these researchers from diverse backgrounds have difficulties acquiring the same resources to pursue their work, which leaves our whole community at a disadvantage. Innovation comes from diversity of thought and everyone deserves a seat at the table. To address this continued lack of diversity, the asset management firm Fiera Capital and the MUHC Foundation launched the Fiera Capital Awards for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Health Care. Fiera Capital has committed $120,000 per year for the next three years to support researchers. There were five awardees this year, and Shawniya Alageswaran is one of the winners. She is a first year PhD student in neuroscience. Shawniya, thank you so much for joining us.

Shawniya Alageswaran: 31:03

Thank you for having me.

Kelly Albert: 31:05

Congratulations on winning this award. I'm really interested to find out why you chose neuroscience as the field that you wanted to pursue.

Shawniya Alageswaran: 31:14

So I've always been interested in science, and I chose to pursue it in my undergrad. And it wasn't until my second year where I took an introductory neuroscience course and I really fell in love with it. I fell in love with how it combined so many different aspects of science into one field. And yes, ever since then, I've been studying neuroscience.

Kelly Albert: 31:36

it must be really interesting to learn about the brain. We had a segment earlier on the show, which talked about neuroscience and how the brain communicates with the body. It must be so fascinating to be on the front line of this seeing those connections and circuits and relationships.

Shawniya Alageswaran: 31:54

Yeah, for sure. It's nice to be on the research end of it, where we ask new questions and figure things out.

Kelly Albert: 32:02

So your research is about the brain and how it processes new information. Can you tell us a little bit about this?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 32:09

Yeah, so I studied synaptic plasticity and how the brain gets changed as it experiences new things. So I study it at a very, very small level. So at the level of synapses, so the connections between two neurons, and I use a technique called patch electrophysiology to do so. So basically, I'm recording the electrical activity between individual neurons. Wow. And so what does this do by recording that relationship? You can see how basically neurons talk to each other. So the brain at a very, very small scale between two neurons, it functions through something called an action potential. To put it simply, it's just basically neurons firing and communicating information to each other and different aspects of how they fire convey different types of information. So when you record those using the technique that I do, you can get an insight into how the brain is doing what it does.

Kelly Albert: 33:14

Interesting, and would it be different from person to person?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 33:17

It could be based on experience; it could be different from brain area to brain area. And there's a whole heap of questions that lies in how there are differences between people between brain areas.

Kelly Albert: 33:30

Incredibly fascinating. We're in conversation with Shawniya Alageswaran, who is one of the winners of the Fiera Capital Award for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Health Care. She's also a first year PhD student in neuroscience. You won the inaugural Fiera Capital Award this year. What does it mean to you to get this award?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 33:49

It means a lot to me, especially because it's the first round did that it's going around. It's nice to have that kind of recognition. And I think it's the first time I've had that kind of recognition as an underrepresented scientist in neuroscience. And so it's really encouraging especially as an early career researcher.

Kelly Albert: 34:11

It must be and it must be also special to know that this award is available to other underrepresented groups, other researchers who are coming up behind you.

Shawniya Alageswaran: 34:22

Yeah, exactly. It demonstrates a sort of abundance and that there's room for more of us in the field. And I'm assuming that they have the same type of encouragement that an award like this gets.

Kelly Albert: 34:35

That's really wonderful. How do you hope this award is going to impact your research project right now?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 34:43

I hope that it will give me more space, as a scientist to have more freedom to think and then also to get more involved in the outreach area of science. So helping other scientists that are like me, supporting other scientists that are like me, those are just some of the few ways I think it's going to help.

Kelly Albert: 35:06

In conversation with Shawniya Alageswaran, who is one of the winners of the Fiera Capital Award for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Health Care. I like that you wanted to help other researchers like yourself. For someone who is so early in your career, what do you see yourself going? Do you have a five year idea of where you're going to end up? Do you have a 10 year plan of where you want to be?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 35:29

I guess my five year plan would take me to approximately the end of my PhD. Coming already from a grad school background, it's hard to see where exactly, you'll end up. But I hope that I'm obviously further along in my project, as I'm just starting. And then I guess in 10 years, I would really like to see myself end up in industry neuroscience research. Again, still in neuroscience. But I'm quite open to work to seeing where the future takes me.

Kelly Albert: 36:03

It must be exciting to get to interact with all of the different researchers and doctors that you deal with and professors that you see on a daily basis. Is it inspiring to have that influence on you to see those different ideas to hear those different ideas, especially from your colleagues to tailor where you're going to end up in the future?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 36:24

Yeah, it's actually quite amazing. I feel like I learn something new each time I have a conversation with them. Whether I'm seeking that information or not. It's nice to see and hear anecdotes from people who are in the same field as you and hear their opinions and thoughts about where the field is going, what they think about where they're going to take their career. So there's never a shortage of information when I interact with my peers, and especially my supervisors.

Kelly Albert: 36:53

In conversation with Shawniya Alageswaran, one of the winners of the Fiera Capital Awards for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Health Care. What message would you have for Fiera Capital, and for the MUHC Foundation, for the public at large upon winning this award for the first time? What would you want them to know about what this means to you?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 37:13

I would like to thank them, first of all. I would also like to show my appreciation and recognition for their hard work for making a stand and offering something like this for underrepresented scientists. I think this is such a great start at addressing the systemic barriers that exist for us. And I'm excited to see what they have in plan for the future in terms of their additional outreach that they're going to do.

Kelly Albert: 37:45

Do you hope to see more awards like this for underrepresented groups?

Shawniya Alageswaran: 37:50

Yeah, for sure, especially more tailored awards, because not all groups are underrepresented equally. There's definitely imbalances within the underrepresented scientists. So it would be nice, looking around in a room, to see everyone represented in an equitable way. So yeah, that's what I'd like to see.

Kelly Albert: 38:13

As I mentioned, I think diversity of thought, comes from diversity of people. So you need to have a lot of different groups represented to make sure that we can really innovate and push the boundaries and get to where we want to go.

Shawniya Alageswaran: 38:26

Exactly, the last thing you'd want is sort of an echo chamber. So it's nice to have diverse voices.

Kelly Albert: 38:32

It's wonderful. Shawniya, congratulations once more. I'm so thrilled that you won this award and I really look forward to hearing where your research takes you.

Shawniya Alageswaran: 38:41

Thank you for having me. I really enjoyed this talk.

Kelly Albert: 38:44

Thank you so much. That is Shawniya Alageswaran, who is one of the winners of the fear capital awards for equity, diversity and inclusion in healthcare. And she is also a first year PhD student in neuroscience at McGill University. I'm Kelly Albert, thank you for tuning in. What would you like to hear about on the show you can write to me at healthmatters at MUHCFoundation.com. You can also follow the MUHC Foundation on social media or sign up for our newsletter at MUHCFoundation.com. I hope you'll join me again next Sunday. Thank you so much for listening to Health Matters and stay healthy.