COVID-19 Network of Clinical Trials Networks

The Data Strategy Working Group was established to engage experts from across Canada in developing a strategy to leverage new technologies that improve data collection and analytics for clinical trials in a real-world context.

The Network of Networks is facilitating implementation and testing of a data infrastructure to support clinical trials by identifying prospective pilot sites and building local awareness in collaboration with individuals, teams and departments within each member’s organization or jurisdiction.

This Working Group is Co-Chaired in collaboration with Health Data Research Network Canada (HDRN) to maintain alignment across the respective multi-jurisdictional CIHR-funded networks.

Data Strategy Working Group leads

Michaël Chassé, Centre Hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal

Nicole Yada, Health Data Research Network Canada

The Network of Networks seeks to advance equity-focused health care through equity focused research. Specifically, we are:

▸ Integrating EDII-related considerations into research design and practices

▸ Promoting equitable and inclusive participation in the research system, including on research teams; and

▸ Collecting data and conducting analyses needed to include EDII considerations in decision-making

We commit to increasing the representation and role of Indigenous peoples in Network activities in order to improve the care of critically ill Indigenous peoples in Canada.

Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Indigeneity Working Group Leads

Kirsten Fiest, University of Calgary

Sangeeta Mehta, Mount Sinai Hospital

The Network of Networks is growing the network of clinicians and researchers who participate in outpatient and hospital-based non-critical care research on COVID, sepsis and other significant infectious diseases in Canada.
 
Specifically, the group is engaging medical subspecialists in hospital-based research, especially in the domains of general internal medicine, infectious diseases and microbiology, respirology and cardiology. They are linking research taking place in the community, on the medical wards and on clinical teaching units, with research taking place in the critical care setting.

Hospital Based Research Working Group leads

Emily Gibson McDonald, McGill University
 
Nick Daneman, Sunnybrook Research Institute

The Network of Networks has partnered with the Canadian Clinical Research Network, an initiative created by l'Université de Sherbrooke and also supported by Sepsis Canada. This network leads metrics and tracking for Network of Networks sites and trials.
 
The Canadian Clinical Research Network:
 
▸ Describes studies conducted across Canadian hospitals: their patient populations, interventions, comparators and outcomes; the data and biological specimens they collect; and their enrollment over time at each site
 
▸ Collects details on participating Canadian hospitals, with a focus on the local clinical research infrastructure
 
Hospital Sites, Metrics, Tracking Working Group leads

Michelle Kho, McMaster University

François Lamontagne, Université de Sherbrooke 

The Network of Networks is leveraging its members' extensive knowledge translation and mobilization roles within national and international agencies to build our knowledge translation community, strengthen established national and international partnerships, and enhance engagement of patients and family caregivers. Through an integrated knowledge mobilization network approach, knowledge users are involved throughout the Network’s activities.

Knowledge Translation Working Group leads

Fostering partnership between patients and family and researchers and other health care professionals is at the core of the Network of Networks' activities.
 
Building and strengthening its links with patients, families and caregivers, the Network of Networks Patient and Family Partnerships Working Group is curating and developing resources for the research community, patients and family members to facilitate and improve engagement.

Patient & Family Partnerships Working Group leads

Lauralyn McIntyre, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute

May Solis, Patient & Family Partner

The Network is helping to build a platform trial infrastructure, including the creation of a Director of Platform Trials role.
 
The Canadian Adaptive Platform Trial (Can- ADAPT) platform will provide opportunities for research teams to study priority interventions into a platform structure highlighted by common case report forms, outcome definitions, informed consent processes, contracts, and an analytic structure. It will be piloted in 2022 with two initial trials.
 
Creating the templates and processes for APTs will not only make the approach more efficient and cost-effective, it will enable researchers to utilize this novel research design more easily, facilitating adoption by a broader and more diverse community of investigators.
 
Platform Trials Working Group leads

Maureen Meade, McMaster University

Ryan Zarychanski, University of Manitoba

The Canadian COVID-19 Emergency Department Rapid Response Network (CCEDRRN) is a national collaboration with Public Health partners to harmonize data collection related to COVID-19 in more than 51 Emergency Departments across 8 provinces.

Pre-Hospital and Emergency Working Group lead

Patrick Archambault, CSSS Alphonse-Desjardins CHAU Hôtel-Dieu de Lévis

To be able to respond quickly and efficiently to health emergencies, the Network of Networks is developing legal and regulatory tools for expediting investigator-led clinical trials research.

We will support efforts to streamline current process, and to create unique, timesaving processes where needed that can be invoked in response to a declared health emergency.

Regulatory, Legal and Ethics Working Group leads

Srinivas Murthy, BC Children's Hospital

Alexis Turgeon, Université Laval

The Network of Networks is improving care for patients with COVID-19 and addressing rehabilitation and recovery for survivors of COVID-19. This working group connects with other networks and trials to meet this objective, including:

▸ The REVIVe trial, which is examining the association of frailty, rehabilitation, and extubation with short term outcomes

▸ The Canadian COVID-19 Prospective Cohort Study (CANCOV) collaboration and multi-centre prospective observational study, looking at long-term outcomes for ambulatory and hospitalized patients.

Rehabilitation & Recovery Working Group leads

Angela Cheung, University Health Network

Michelle Kho, McMaster University

webinar series 

 The Network of Networks is developing resources to streamline study startup, management and recruitment, and creating training and professional supports that will facilitate research coordination across the country.

RC Template and Resource Library

Research Coordinators Working Group lead

Katie O'Hearn, Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario

The Network of Networks is providing training and mentoring opportunities that foster the conduct of rigorous, relevant, ethical, and efficient COVID-19 research to three key stakeholder groups from academic and community institutions:

▸ Early-career, mid-career and senior investigators

▸ Research coordinators, new and established

▸ Citizens, including patients and family members across Canada

Training and Mentoring Working Group leads

Dominique Piquette, University of Toronto

Krista Wollny, University of Calgary