We develop and translate innovative research that supports and advances service delivery and policy-making for health care and community-based needs. Our work aims to contribute to shaping healthy, sustainable and resilient communities. Explore our current and past initiatives to learn more about the work we do.
The Centre for Health and Community Research (CHCR) is located at the University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI) in Charlottetown, PEI. We work and collaborate with valued partners locally, in Canada and beyond with the goal of helping to address health- and community-related issues through research.
The CHCR provides a wide variety of research services and expertise with particular focus on patient engagement and using administrative data. For more information, click on the corresponding box below.
Please email us at chcr@upei.ca for more information about our research services.
The diversity of our researchers’ backgrounds and perspectives supports our multidisciplinary approach. Our team’s experiences and expertise include the areas of:
Administrative data are the routine information that government and organizations collect to provide services and/or accept payment as they operate.
Though this information is not originally collected for research purposes, administrative data can be used as a cost-effective alternative to primary data collection. In many cases (e.g., health), administrative data have the added advantage of containing information about almost entire populations. These rich, population-based data sources contain a wealth of information about people and the services they receive, data that would otherwise be impossible to obtain on a similar scale.
Administrative health data provide an important source of evidence that researchers can use to gain a better understanding of the factors impacting population health and well-being to contribute to policy planning and design.The use of administrative data requires careful consideration of legal and legislative requirements, data quality, and confidentiality. The CHCR has staff with extensive experience working with administrative data in various sectors who can assist you with using this type of data for research. The CHCR is also the PEI lead of the Canadian-wide network of data repositories working together to facilitate one-stop access to administrative datasets for multijurisdictional research.
Patient-oriented research (POR) actively engages patients and other stakeholders in research. Patient refers to individuals with lived experience of a health issue, their caregivers, family members, or friends. Meaningful engagement focuses on patient-identified priorities to ensure research results are accessible, meaningful, and relevant to them. As Canadians, we have all had experiences with the health system, so we can all be considered Patient Partners in health research.
Patient Partners may be engaged in research through governance committees, as team members on specific projects, or as Patient Partners at large. When these individuals are involved in research, they are often engaged as equal members of the team and in all phases of the research process. This can include identifying and developing research priorities and questions, analyzing and interpreting the data, and implementing the results. The level of engagement is flexible and is determined in collaboration with the Patient Partners.
If you are interested in becoming a Patient Partner, please check out the Patient Engagement section of the MSSU Website and fill out the Patient Partner Expression of Interest Form. Through the Maritime SPOR SUPPORT Unit (MMSU), support is available for Patient Partners, researchers, and community organizations to identify research priorities and to collaborate in research. The MSSU offers regular Patient-Oriented Research Training Sessions, which can be found in their training and events calendar.