NU - hospital collaboration earns grant
A team featuring Nipissing University professor, Dr. Darren Campbell, assistant professor of psychology, has received one of two Collaborative Mental Health Research Fund grants. Campbell is collaborating with the North Bay Regional Health Centre’s Dr. Sandra Stewart, clinical neuropsychologist and adjunct professor at Nipissing; and Dr. Ralph Dell'Aquila, addiction medicine physician.
The grant-winning program is titled: Resting State fMRI in Prescription Opioid Addiction: Effect of Methadone and Cannabis on Neural Networks and Implications for Treatment. It represents the first functional MRI project to be conducted here in North Bay and the North Eastern Ontario.
The one-year grant is worth $25,000.
Here is a summary of the research:
An alarming increase in abuse and dependence on prescription opioids has occurred within the last 10 years (Upadhyay et al, 2010) and presents as a crisis in many Northern Ontario communities (Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse, 2013; Gomes et al, 2011). Such drug addiction has wide-spread negative consequences on people’s personal, interpersonal, and occupational well-being. The gold standard treatment for opiate/opioid addictions is opiate replacement therapy (i.e., methadone). A subset of these patients are also addicted to cannabis, creating unique pharmacological and psychological treatment challenges. Brain function studies of brain health have provided important treatment guidance with various psychiatric populations (Bryant et al., 2008; Doehrmann et al., 2013; Konarski et al., 2009). However, there is a paucity of brain function data in patients on methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) for prescription opioid addiction (POA). This research project seeks to examine brain functioning in POA patients using state-of-the-art functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technology. Our specific research goals are to assess the brain health of POA patients on stable methadone maintenance treatment: 1) without cannabis dependence, and 2) with concurrent cannabis dependence. We expect altered brain functioning in brain systems associated with: 1) pleasure seeking and 2) cognitive and motivational control. Results will lay the foundation for developing novel and targeted multidisciplinary treatment approaches for these populations. This functional brain imaging project will be a first for Northeastern Ontario. As such, it will serve as a catalyst for further collaborative research into mental health and addiction studies using advanced MRI technology.
The Collaborative Mental Health Research Fund is focused on investing in research for North Eastern Ontario by uniting multi-disciplinary and multi-institutional teams focused on improving clinical care, health systems planning, and population health within the fields of mental health and addictions.
The program was established in June 2013, and awards a total of two research team grants to a maximum of $25,000. This annual funding was originally sourced by the North Bay Regional Health Centre and the Sudbury/Manitoulin District Mental Health Fund Committee. Funds are managed by the North Bay Regional Health Centre Foundation.
The August 2013 competition received applications across a broad range of topics and disciplines. All proposals submitted to the Collaborative Mental Health Research Fund were reviewed by independent scientific experts selected from North Eastern Ontario from a variety of disciplines. The evaluations and ratings of the individual scientific reviews are completed remotely and in a structured manner. Reviewers assign scores according to a set of predetermined criteria. This ensures that all applications are treated equally as the same criteria and cut-offs are applied to all applications.