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Brighter World

United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

Health Collaborations

McMaster University’s world-leading health-focused collaborations have significant impact on well-being and health outcomes globally, nationally and locally. Our Global Health Office works with national and international networks, including the United Nations and the World Health Organization, and has numerous partnerships with institutions in developing countries. The McMaster Health Forum’s 75+ partners include the World Health Organization and the Pan-American Health Organization, federal government departments, numerous provincial government bodies, and municipal and academic bodies.

School of Nursing promotes local partnerships 

McMaster Institute for Research on Aging: Local work 

The McMaster Institute for Research on Aging (MIRA) is dedicated to addressing the complex issues facing an aging population worldwide which profoundly impact individuals, families, communities, and health and social care systems. MIRA’s network of researchers work to engage the older adult community, their families, healthcare providers, and other key stakeholders to optimize the health and longevity of the aging population.  

  • McMaster’s Housing and Conference Services has partnered with MIRA to create a Timeless Living Learning Community for students from any discipline who are passionate about health and aging. Students are connected to older adults living in the community to build meaningful and lasting relationships and gain new perspectives. 

Reimagining Primary Care 

  • The David Braley Primary Care Research Collaborative brings together a number of innovative research projects led by McMaster’s family medicine department that brings together the research, education and clinical care expertise of a strong network of primary care leaders. The collaborative works within the community, helping to resolve a wide range of issues through a cluster of targeted programs. The research collaborative launched in September 2020 through a $4 million investment — seeded by a $1 million contribution by philanthropist David Braley.  
  • Community Paramedicine at Clinic connects low-income older adults with health-care providers, with the goal of preventing chronic disease, reducing 911 calls and improving seniors’ quality of life and health outcomes. Two randomized controlled trials found CP@clinic to be effective in reducing 911 calls by as much as 20 per cent.  
  • The Health Tapestry program relies on community volunteers to conduct in-home visits with older patients, tracking health and life goals with customized software which passes the information on to the client’s primary health care team, allowing care providers to learn more about their patients, so they can help them stay healthy.
  • TAPER is another patient-centred program that aims to safely lower the number of medications the individual takes. The collaborative also runs prison health research program, talking with people who are incarcerated about how to improve their health, and an Indigenous Teaching Through Art program.

MacCardiac Rehabilitation Program supports local community 

McMaster University’s Physical Activity Centre of Excellence (PACE) collaborates with Hamilton Health Sciences on the MacCardiac Rehabilitation Program, which provides safe and appropriate exercise programs for patients with heart disease. Supervised exercise sessions are designed to meet the individual needs and fitness levels of each patient. Our goals are to improve the exercise capacity and quality of life for patients with heart disease, promote lifelong heart-healthy lifestyles, and reduce future risk of heart disease. 

McMaster Digital Transformation Research Centre  

The goal of the McMaster Digital Transformation Research Centre is to expand knowledge of digital transformation opportunities and challenges to allow researchers to create rich and meaningful user experiences. This innovative facility leverages neuroscience tools and techniques to provide researchers with an understanding of how the use of technology impacts us. MDTRC’s Mobile User Experience Lab (MUXL) seeks to reduce barriers facing underrepresented groups with special needs, and provide them an equal opportunity to participate in shaping the design of products and services they use, to ensure that these products can ultimately accommodate their cognitive and physical needs. This one-of-a-kind facility brings research to the community to enhance inclusion of groups such as older adults and the disabled in research.

McMaster Health Forum 

The McMaster Health Forum joined forces with Trillium Health Partners to support Ontario Health Teams (OHTs), using a ‘rapid learning and improvement’ lens through RISE. RISE’s mission is to contribute to the Ontario Ministry of Health’s OHT Central Program of Supports by providing timely and responsive access to Ontario-based ‘rapid-learning and improvement’ assets. 

The Forum co-leads COVID-END, a network of partners established to help health- and social-system leaders as they responded to unprecedented challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic. While much of COVID-END’s work has come to an end, we continue to maintain an updated inventory of evidence syntheses, respond to requests for evidence on key topics, and share spotlights on updates or new evidence products relevant to global and Canadian stakeholders.

An interdisciplinary team of McMaster researchers will be conducting a major investigation into the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on children and youth in Canada. The $3.1 million project is funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and will be led by Kathy Georgiades, Associate Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioural Neurosciences. The team of researchers will partner with Statistics Canada, the Public Health Agency of Canada, and Children’s Healthcare Canada to collect data on children’s physical, mental, and social well-being. 

McMaster is the host university of the Canadian Research Data Centre Network, which received $17.4 million from the Canadian government in 2022. The investment will help enable university research and training in a wide array of disciplines in the health and social sciences that inform key areas of public policy. 

School of Nursing promotes national partnerships 

  • A School of Nursing faculty member is Scientific Director of the National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools (NCCMT). During the pandemic, NCCMT has provided services to public health professionals related to Covid-19 including rapid evidence service and public health evidence reviews. 
  • Students in our BScN Program (Basic BScN, RPN-BScN, or Accelerated Stream), have an opportunity to apply for a 12-week professional practice placement in a remote setting in their final year. This placement is not “voluntourism.” It is a truly immersive process in which students live, learn, and work in a lower-income country or remote northern Canadian community. Students are challenged at every level, and inevitably return with new perspectives on global inequities and a passion to meaningfully contribute to a more just world. 
  • Nursing residency program: The Government of Nunavut’s Department of Health, in collaboration with St. Joseph’s Hospital and the BScN program within the School of Nursing, has developed a residency program to address the increasing demand for nurses in Nunavut. This program will support the transition of newly graduated nurses into the Nunavut nursing workforce, with a focus on community health nursing. 
  • A faculty member is using CIHR funds conducting research on palliative care during Covid-19 across three Provinces. 

McMaster Institute for Research on Aging: National work 

The McMaster Institute for Research on Aging (MIRA) is dedicated to addressing the complex issues facing an aging population worldwide which profoundly impact individuals, families, communities, and health and social care systems. MIRA’s network of researchers work to engage the older adult community, their families, healthcare providers, and other key stakeholders to optimize the health and longevity of the aging population.  

  • The MIRA | Dixon Hall Centre was formed in partnership with Toronto’s Dixon Hall, a multi-service agency supporting older adults. This collaboration is enhancing research with, and services for, older people facing housing insecurity, barriers to transportation and transitions in care, such as hospital-to-home and at end-of-life.   
  • MIRA runs major programs of research to understand large and complex issues in aging. In 2019 the Labarge Centre for Mobility in Aging and MIRA funded our first cohort, with projects on physical mobility and social participation (EMBOLDEN Study), assessing early mobility limitations through technology (MacM3) and promoting mobility during hospitalizations through wearable sensors. In 2021, MIRA and the LCMA began developing a second cohort. The themes for this round include: intergenerational approaches to aging and mobility; complex interventions for frailty; and aging, technology and digital equity. 

School of Rehabilitation Science provides COVID-19 solutions 

McMaster professor Marla Beauchamp conducted research and shared findings through the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging about aging, mobility, rehabilitation and Long COVID.

  • McMaster University’s School of Rehabilitation Science developed the guidance document on Rehabilitation for Patients with COVID-19 for occupational therapists, physical therapists, speech-language pathologists, and assistants. The document was endorsed by the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists, the Canadian Physiotherapy Association, and Speech-Language & Audiology Canada.  
  • Dr. Dina Brooks of McMaster’s School of Rehabilitation Sciences is president of the Canadian Thoracic Society. Under her leadership, CTS developed a face mask position statement that informed government mask policy in Canada during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.  

McMaster collaborates on FAST flu surveillance tool 

McMaster University has partnered with WELL Health Technologies Corp. to launch FAST, an innovative Flu Automated Surveillance Tool for FluWatch, a program of the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC). FAST provides PHAC with real-time identification of patients with flu-like symptoms without sharing of any patient health data, enabling PHAC to act more quickly to emerging risks of outbreaks. In 2021, the tool expanded to include surveillance of COVID-like illness. 

“FAST can be adapted easily to increase the frequency of surveillance at any time, or to extend surveillance to other areas of concern such as COVID-19,” said Dr. David Price, Professor and Chair of McMaster’s Department of Family Medicine. 

Innovative solutions to national challenges in health and healthcare

  • McMaster’s eHealth program: eHealth is a joint program offered by the DeGroote School of Business and McMaster Faculties of Engineering and Health Sciences. Through the program, students embark on eight-month internships in health and healthcare, where they focus on delivering innovative solutions to challenges across the health landscape in Canada. Students contribute via internships that combine their passion for data and technology to improve patient care in Canada’s health system. 
  • The Clinic at the DeGroote School of Business: The Clinic helps with the commercialization of McMaster’s vast repository of research by allowing DeGroote MBA candidates to take an idea to market. The McMaster Industry Liaison Office (MILO) helps to identify potential projects with a medical focus. The Clinic brings MBA students together with inventors to uncover opportunities of commercialization, apply their education in a safe learning environment, and gain real-world entrepreneurial experience.  
  • Alternative Level of Care: Making data-driven decisions to inform policymaking in healthcare. Manaf Zargoush, Associate Professor, Health Policy and Management examines the Alternative Level of Care (ALC) issue. With expertise in advanced data analytics, this research looks at how to use Machine Learning (ML) to make the best decisions regarding moving older adults from hospitals to LTCs.
  • Equity-Based Co-Production: Advancing health and wellbeing with vulnerable populations. Gillian Mulvale, Associate Professor, Health Policy and Management is working to advance Equity-Based Co-Production that recognizes the contributions of equity-deserving groups as experience experts. Instead of being a passive recipient of services – which are designed and delivered by others – the co-design, or co-creation, process takes into account the valuable experiences of service users when designing, delivering, and improving public services.

McMaster University’s Global Health Office 

The UN Sustainable Development Goals are fundamental to the work of McMaster’s Global Health Office (GHO). The Office’s mission is to support McMaster’s researchers, educators, students, and clinicians in building partnerships with global development organizations and funding agencies, to commit research and education focused on people’s health worldwide.   

The GHO works with national and international networks, including the Consortium of Universities of Global Health and the Canadian Coalition for Global Health Research. The GHO collaborates with global health networks and initiatives, including the United Nations, World Health Organization, the Pan-American Health Organization, Universitas21 Health Sciences Group SDG Initiative, Academics Without Borders, the Canadian Bureau for International Education, and the Tula Foundation.  

For the last decade, the GHO has formed numerous partnerships with institutions and governments in developing countries — for example, advancing the education of women health professionals in Pakistan, improving the health of vulnerable people in Indonesia, and increasing access to health education in underserved communities in the High North regions of Canada and Norway.   

With a growing network of global partners, McMaster’s Global Health Office is committed to working together in support of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which connects our initiatives with the relevant SDGs.   

McMaster’s Global Health Office initiatives include:  

  • Master of Science in Global Health is an international award-winning program with educational partnerships spanning five continents and seven countries. Designed to prepare graduates for careers in a globalized world, the program immerses students in experiential learning environments that stress high-quality transdisciplinary research and global teamwork. Our higher education partner institutions include: Maastricht University, The Netherlands; Manipal Academy of Higher Education,India; Thammasat University, Thailand; University of South-Eastern, Norway; and Ahfad University for Women, Sudan. Together with our growing network of global partner institutions, we are working in support of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. An interactive map shows locations of field practicums and the targeted SDGs.  
  • Collaboration between McMaster and the Universidad del Rosario McMaster has been increasing collaboration with partner institution Universidad del Rosario in Colombia, targeting SDGs 3, 4, 5 and 17, as part of our graduate Global Health programming. With funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), McMaster Global Health faculty are working with Rosario faculty on a research partnership focusing on adolescent and sexual and reproductive health (SRH) in humanitarian emergencies. McMaster and Rosario also launched a multi-lingual, transnational pilot project, using machine learning technology to overcome language and communication barriers and facilitate teamwork between students. The three-month exchange prioritizes international experience and experiential learning, and this year for the first time, students in the Master’s in Public Health at the Universidad del Rosario in Bogota, Colombia were able to take a part in this unique offering. This initiative was developed in consultation with, and supported by, McMaster University’s MacPherson Institute and University Technical Services, as well as representatives from Microsoft Canada, who are monitoring and evaluating the project on an ongoing basis. On the basis of these strengthened contacts between faculty at Rosario and McMaster, new research initiatives have been developed including exploring the use of artificial intelligence in health services for marginalized people in Bogota. 
  • Doctoral Program in Global Health: In September 2020, McMaster and Maastricht University in the Netherlands launched a cotutelle doctoral program in Global Health, committed to supporting and contributing to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The PhD prioritizes experiential learning, internationalization and innovation in higher education. Students have the option to work towards a PhD that is jointly awarded by McMaster and Maastricht.  See the 2023 Report on Global Health. See the 2023 Global Health Annual Review report here.
      
  • UN SDG Website: The SDG website highlights the important research work McMaster University is doing to meet the United Nations’ Sustainable Development goals (SDGs). The site includes profiles of 17 McMaster researchers and their work – each connected to one of the 17 SDGs – and offers a leading practices toolkit for aligning research with the SDGs. The objective is to share these strategies with other institutions and researchers. This initiative has been funded by a grant from the federal government’s Employment and Social development Canada (ESDC): Sustainable Development Goals Funding Program, awarded to the research team in the Global Health Office. See link to Brighter World McMaster article.  
  • Global Health Annual Review: An open-access, student-run journal that showcases global health scholarship influenced by the UN Sustainable Development Goals. We encourage students, alumni, and faculty to submit research that targets the SDGs, which we then share with our community. From water and sanitation in Ghana to Canada’s COVID-19 response in marginalized communities, the articles demonstrate the diversity of global health research.
      
  • Global Health Learning Symposium: The 2022 symposium brought together 350 students and 37 faculty from McMaster and its partner institutions in the Netherlands, India, Colombia and Thailand. Taking place virtually across 12 time zones and 27 countries, students tuned in from around the world including Ireland, Germany, Portugal, Vietnam, India, and Gambia. Student presentations were divided thematically using the SDGs and topics that ranged from migrant and refugee health, mental health, Indigenous health, and the COVID-19 pandemic. This year, SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), SDG 5 (Gender Equality), and SDG 10 (Reducing Inequalities) were among the top themes. More details on the symposium are available here.
      
  • International Interdisciplinary Summer Institute: The summer institute brings together educators from around the world to exchange ideas and share best practices on curriculum development, experiential learning and innovation in various disciplines including medicine, nursing, pharmaceutical science. Programming centres on SDGs 3 and 4.
      
  • Catalyst 2030: McMaster is the first Canadian University to join Catalyst 2030, an international network that fosters social innovation in support of achieving SDGs. As part of our commitment to facilitating collaboration between social entrepreneurs and innovators to help tackle the root causes of social problems and drive systemic change, McMaster hosted the inaugural meeting of the Canadian Forum on Innovation and Societal Impact in October 2022, convening stakeholders across the social, municipal and innovation sectors to align education, practice and policy around social innovation. 

McMaster University’s Global Nexus

Global Nexus is a partnership focused health innovation accelerator, transforming how the modern university serves society by bringing together stakeholders from across sectors and working together in new ways to more efficiently move products from the lab to society.

School of Nursing promotes international partnerships 

  • McMaster’s School of Nursing (SON) is designated a PAHO/WHO Collaborating Centre, which focuses on global priorities in primary health care, such as universal access to health. For example, McMaster researchers are involved in projects related to the critical health workforce shortage in the Caribbean.

McMaster Health Forum 

The McMaster Health Forum works with government policymakers, organizational leaders, professionals and citizens to formalize and strengthen local and national evidence-support systems, to enhance and leverage the global evidence architecture, and to put evidence at the centre of everyday life. The McMaster Health Forum’s 75+ partners include international organizations such as the World Health Organization (for which it has been designated the WHO Collaborating Centre for Evidence-Informed Policy) and the Pan American Health Organization, leaders in Canadian and other jurisdictions around the world who also need or provide evidence support, and academic bodies. 

  • The Forum is a member of the UN’s Sustainable Development Solutions Network, which promotes integrated approaches to implementing the SDGs, and in this role co-hosted a workshop in New York City to coincide with the UN General Assembly, focusing on a new initiative bringing research evidence on achieving the SDGs to policymakers and other decision makers. 
  • The Forum has also expanded its reach and accelerated its impacts by creating and co-leading impact-oriented networks at the provincial level (with Rapid-Improvement Support and Exchange, or RISE), national level (with the COVID-19 Evidence Network to support Decision-making, or COVID-END), and global level (with COVID-END’s 50+ global partners and the Global Commission on Evidence to Address Societal Challenges). 
  • The Global Commission on Evidence to Address Societal Challenges, co-led by the Forum, brought together 25 commissioners (including government policymakers, organizational leaders, professionals and citizens) who address a range of societal challenges in their respective roles. The Commission’s report finds that decision-makers responding to present-day societal challenges and tomorrow’s crises have an unprecedented opportunity to build on what has worked in using evidence before and during the pandemic. The report’s 24 recommendations call for decisive action by multiple stakeholders to ensure evidence is consistently used to address societal challenges. We believe we can go farther, faster together by: 
    • strengthening domestic evidence infrastructure through rapid learning and improvement 
    • enhancing and leveraging the global evidence architecture 
    • engaging citizens and citizen-serving NGOs in putting evidence at the centre of everyday life. 
  • To better support its networks, as well as other decision-makers around the world, the Forum has developed (and continues to update) free, searchable databases that are accessed by over 15,500 registered users globally as the most comprehensive access points for policymakers, researchers and stakeholders seeking evidence on a wide range of issues,  These include Health Systems Evidence, Social Systems Evidence, and the COVID-END inventory of evidence syntheses. 

Advanced training for physicians 

The School of Medicine has a very well documented, highly successful program that provides free, advanced medical training for physicians from LMIC through a partnership with St. Joseph’s Healthcare called the St. Joseph’s International Outreach program.   

Collaboration between McMaster and University of Alabama at Birmingham 

Multimillion-dollar gifts made by Alabama physician and philanthropist Marnix Heersink and his wife, Mary, to McMaster University and the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) have helped launch the The Marnix E. Heersink School of Biomedical Innovation and Entrepreneurship.The funding will create biotech commercialization hubs and global health institutes at both universities and spur the growth of a new cross-border innovation economy in Hamilton and Birmingham as both cities continue the transition from heavy industry to health care and service industries.

McMaster Institute for Research on Aging: International work 

The McMaster Institute for Research on Aging (MIRA) is dedicated to addressing the complex issues facing an aging population worldwide, which profoundly impact individuals, families, communities, and health and social care systems. MIRA’s network of researchers work to engage the older adult community, their families, healthcare providers, and other key stakeholders to optimize the health and longevity of the aging population.  

  • McMaster Optimal Aging Portal provides an internationally available information-sharing resource for citizens, clinicians, health care professionals and policymakers on aging, offering the latest scientific evidence on aging and health care topics for seniors. 
  • McMaster joined the network of age-friendly universities, the International Age-Friendly University, a global body made up of higher education institutions that are committed to being more accessible to older adults. 
  • MIRA was invited to join a delegation travelling to the UK to develop partnerships and stimulate investment in aging research in Canada. The visit resulted in MIRA signing a memorandum of understanding with a new international alliance between the Northern Health Science Alliance and the Centre for Aging and Brain Health Innovation. 
  • MIRA is the first Canadian partner in the global VOICE network established by Newcastle University and the UK’s National Innovation Centre for Ageing (NICA). VOICE is a community engagement organization and digital platform that identifies unmet needs and opportunities for aging research and innovation by connecting researchers to a community of older adults, caregivers and members of the public who contribute their lived experiences. In time, this global initiative will support international collaborations that explore complex questions on aging and the experiences of older adults globally. MIRA’s VOICE website launches early 2023. 

Population Health Research Institute 

The Population Health Research Institute (PHRI) is a global health institute, founded by McMaster University and Hamilton Health Sciences, and a world leader in large clinical trials and population studies. An international network of nearly 400 scientists, investigators, research fellows and study team staff tackle global health challenges such as cardiovascular disease, poverty-related infectious disease and under-nutrition, Type 2 diabetes, stroke and cognitive decline.  

The start of PHRI’s third decade as a research institute converged with globally unprecedented challenges with the COVID-19 pandemic. Still, researchers forged ahead – completing and publishing more than 10 high-impact studies and breaking ground with programs in digital health, translational research, and biomarker discovery.  

The international network, let by experts in each country, enables PHRI to rapidly conduct large, global studies. Leaders in PHRI collaborate closely with several of the world’s leading health organizations governments and industry. To date, more than 1.5 million people have participated in studies conducted on six continents in 102 countries. PHRI 2022 research report  

McMaster University’s International Activity Compendium 

A searchable database that highlights McMaster University’s research and scholarly activities with global health and well-being impact. It currently showcases close to 2,000 international partnerships in 247 countries, territories, and islands.  

McMaster University is actively engaged every year in hundreds of international collaborations and partnerships. These connections include research collaborations, faculty exchanges, capacity building initiatives, joint supervision of doctoral students, and student exchanges and mobility agreements. 

Some of the featured partnerships in 2023-2024 include:

Nuclear medicine research for cancer treatment 

McMaster University and Quirem Medical are working together to produce QuiremSpheres – microspheres containing the radioisotope holmium-166 that are used to treat liver cancer. McMaster has already successfully irradiated a set of QuiremSpheres using the McMaster Nuclear Reactor, and these were used to treat patients in Europe. MNR is currently working with Quirem to expand their production of QuiremSpheres to be able to treat patients not just in Europe, but in North America as well. 

Built in 1959, McMaster Nuclear Reactor was the first university-based research reactor in the British Commonwealth. Now the largest research reactor at a Canadian university, it is one of a suite of research facilities at McMaster that generate discoveries in medicine, clean energy, nuclear safety, materials and environmental science. It is one of the world’s largest suppliers of the medical radioisotope iodine-125, used in the treatment of prostate cancer.  

United Nations University at McMaster University 

McMaster is home to the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH), the only UN university located in North America and one of only 14 in the world. The Institute’s mission is to resolve global water challenges by research and action on measures such as provision of safe water and adequate sanitation, bolstering sustainability, ensuring access to essential water services and protecting ecosystems.