Studies in Recruitment
Research is key to transforming heart failure care and empowering patients and their caregivers to live better.
We can’t do it without you. Consider joining a research team or participating in a study underway.
Please note: Each study has its own set of criteria to determine who can participate. This depends on the research question being asked and may include restrictions based on age, behaviours, health status, location, or other traits.
Before enrolling in a study, researchers may ask questions to determine if you are eligible to participate. In some cases, you may have to undergo specific testing, like a blood test or physical exam, to determine whether you can participate.
Interested in recruiting on The Heart Hub?
If you are interested in having your research study posted for recruitment, please complete the online submission form.
Participate in Medly Caretown Trial for Medly Careviers
Are you an adult patient receiving Medly Program at UHN or an informal caregiver of a Medly patient? The Medly Caretown study may be a good fit for you!
The research team at UHN is now actively recruiting both patients and informal caregivers to test a patient-caregiver co-management program called Medly Caretown! It allows caregivers to co-manage heart failure with patients through access to up-to-date information of user’s Medly daily readings, tailored tips both to support Medly user, and to give caregivers an encouraging boost, credible resources, and communication platform to connect with Medly healthcare team.
This study includes:
- Free 24/7 access to Medly Caretown program (including Medly app and Caretown HF app) for 12 weeks
- Feedback and troubleshooting of Medly app and Caretown HF app anytime during the study
- 2 sets of questionnaires and one interview to share program experience
- Receiving 100 CAD for the completion of 3 study visits
Are you interested? If you would like to know more about this study, please feel free to contact us at caretown@uhn.ca or by phone at 416-450-1731. We look forward to hear from you!
Participate in trial of new Medly Messenger Usability Testing
Help Us Improve Medly Messenger – Join Our Usability Sessions! We’ve worked with Medly users to co-design a new feature for Medly Messenger that includes an AI chatbot. Now we’ve built a prototype, and we’d love your help to try it out and tell us how we can make it better.
We’re inviting Medly users to participate in a 1-hour virtual usability session. No technical expertise required—just your experience using Medly! Participants will receive compensation for their time.
If you are interested, please reach out to the Medly CHAT team at pedro.velmovitsky@uhn.ca.
Patient Partner Opportunity: Restenosis Lived Experience
Restenosis, the re-narrowing of arteries after stent placement or angioplasty, increases the risk of heart attacks, repeat procedures, and long-term health complications. We are developing a novel drug-coated balloon (DCB) for angioplasty, designed to deliver targeted therapy during the procedure, effectively reducing restenosis and improving long-term vascular health—all with a single, minimally invasive treatment.
Who Can Participate?
We are seeking patient partners with coronary artery disease (CAD) or peripheral artery disease (PAD) to share their experiences with treatment, recovery, and quality of life. Your insights will directly inform the development of better treatment options for vascular disease. We welcome participation from individuals who meet one or more of the following criteria:
- Patients with coronary artery disease (CAD) who have undergone angioplasty or stent placement for revascularization.
- Patients with peripheral artery disease (PAD) who have undergone angioplasty or stent placement for revascularization.
- Patients diagnosed with PAD who have not yet undergone treatment
What to Expect:
A 30–45 minute virtual conversation about your experiences, challenges, and perspectives on restenosis and vascular treatments.
Your insights will contribute to the design and research aimed at improving patient care and treatment outcomes
Compensation will be provided. Please email nazli.hassanpour@utoronto.ca if interested!
Taking Medication for Heart Failure? Help us understand the journey to finding your "Right Dose"
Getting to the optimal medication dose often requires frequent monitoring. However, the process of identifying the ideal dosage may have impacted your daily life through difficulties in scheduling and travelling for blood tests.
UrInsights, a team founded by a biomedical engineer Jad Fadlallah from the University of Toronto, are studying the logistics of blood work and dose adjustments and need to hear your experience with appointments, bloodwork, and transparency.
Who we need:
- Have heart failure (any type) and had a medication dose change (increase or decrease, ideally in the past year) that required bloodwork and a clinic visit beforehand
- Ideally has limited access to transportation to/from clinics and/or
- Ideally has difficulties in scheduling clinic/bloodwork.
- Caregivers of someone who meets the above.
The Details:
- What: A 30-minute chat (Zoom/Teams/phone).
- We’ll ask about your experience booking labs, getting blood drawn, timelines to dose changes, challenges (transportation, scheduling, symptoms) and how that impacts your wellbeing.
Compensation: We provide a $22 honorarium for your time.
We’ll accommodate your preferred language, caregiver presence, and any accessibility needs. Taking part is completely voluntary. This is part of our learning process and not a research study. What you share will help us build something that works better for real people, not be published.
Interested? Email jad.fadlalla@gmail.com with the subject line “Patient Partner – HF Interview”. Please include your preferred contact method and a few time windows that work for you.
Thank you for helping us make medication optimization safer, faster, and better.
Patient Partner Opportunity: UHN Biospecimen Services Governance Board
Are you a young heart failure patient passionate about advancing medical research?
UHN Biospecimen Services is seeking a patient partner to join our committee. Your role will involve:
- Reviewing and approving biospecimen management policies and procedures.
- Ensuring alignment with UHN Research Ethics Board for all studies.
- Overseeing biospecimen resources and budgets.
- Supporting transparent and accountable operations.
- Advising on implementing a centralized consent program.
- Promoting equitable and inclusive biobanking practices.
Help us ensure high-quality, ethical, and innovative research at UHN. Please contact Heidi Wagner at heidi.wagner@uhn.ca today to make a difference!
From the Heart: Canadian women’s lived experiences of heart failure
SPOR Patient and Public Topic Suggestions
SPOR Evidence Alliance
At the SPOR Evidence Alliance, we value the importance of patient identified priorities in shaping the health research landscape, and ultimately informing changes across the health system that address patient needs.
If you are interested in a health topic that you feel is important in improving patient health outcomes and the health system, we would like to hear about it.
Who can submit a health topic?
We welcome all interested patients and members of the public to propose topics for future SPOR Evidence Alliance projects.
What topics are appropriate?
We would like to hear about health topics that identify an opportunity to improve health outcomes, medical or public health practice, and health systems in Canada.
Please note that it is not necessary to submit your topic as a structured research question. If your topic is selected for further study, we will work with you to develop the question.
TRANSFORM HF Peer Review Panels
Dr. Heather Ross and Dr. Craig Simmons
TRANSFORM HF funds research and trainees focused on digital technologies for equitable access to high-quality personalized heart failure care. Our mission is also to enable patients to become more active in their own health and engage them in all of our programs.
Competitions are described at: www.transformhf.ca/opportunities Patients, caregivers and family members living with heart failure are integral members of our review panel to select funded projects and trainees. If you are interested in joining a panel, email info@transformhf.ca.
Sharon Bray
Paula Henderson
Isabel Victal
Cindy