Message from Norman Rosenblum, INMD Scientific Director
May 2019

I was very pleased to participate in the 2019 Canadian Nutrition Society (CNS) Annual Conference in Niagara Falls Ontario, May 3-4, 2019. As part of the meeting, INMD hosted a symposium featuring researchers funded through an INMD strategic research initiative on Food and Health. These grants are nearing completion and it was interesting to learn about what has been accomplished to date.

Dr. Deborah O’Connor (Sick Kids Hospital) provided an overview of her funded research study, OPTIMOM: Optimizing Mothers’ Milk for Preterm Infants. The funding she received enabled integration of a large network of clinicians and institutions caring for very low birth weight (VLBW) infants - the Rogers Hixon Ontario Human Milk Bank, researchers, and policy makers - to take a comprehensive approach to explore early nutrition. Dr. Moshe Ben-Shoshan (McGill University), who is working with Bruce Mazur, presented on GET-FACTS: Genetics, Environment and Therapies: Food Allergy Clinical Tolerance Studies and oral immunotherapy (OIT). This group started the first Canadian study to assess the efficacy and safety of milk OIT in Canadian children, and more recently, expanded to assess egg, peanut and tree nut OIT. Dr. Sonia Anand (McMaster University) presented her research on the NutriGen Alliance, which brings together four birth cohorts to investigate the nutrition and genetic influences in pregnancy and among offspring on the development of cardio-metabolic and allergy traits. Her group has been studying dietary patterns and diet quality and the association with gestational diabetes mellitus in South Asian mothers, and the differential effects on infant birthweight comparing white Caucasian and South Asian offspring. Dr. Simone Lemieux (Laval University) presented her research, Adherence to Healthy Eating Guidelines: Challenges and Opportunities. Dr. Lemieux’s research focused on the measurement of adherence to healthy eating using the automated, self-administered web-based 24-hour recall tool developed by her team, and the many factors that influence healthy eating. Finally, Dr. David Jenkins (University of Toronto) presented an update of a multi-centre trial of diet (dietary portfolio) and exercise. This trial will be used to compare the effects of diet and exercise strategies in high risk patients with carotid plaque diagnosed by carotid ultrasound and followed up by carotid and coronary MRI as markers of cardiovascular disease.

Thanks to all of the presenters (featured above) who shared their research findings to date, and to the Canadian Nutrition Society for including INMD in their meeting program!

Norman Rosenblum, MD, FRCPC
Scientific Director, CIHR-INMD

Date modified:

2019-05-24