Douglas Hospital Research Centre Partners with Montreal Neurological Institute to open Its Brain Imaging Group

Douglas Hospital researchers are excited about their new toys: a state of the art neuroimaging analysis platform and a high speed connection to the Montreal Neurological Institute. This connection allows them to study the scanned brains of people suffering from mental disorders in order to better understand brain function and the role it plays in mental illness. The Douglas Hospital’s Brain Imaging Group (BIG) is the first research team of its kind to study brain imaging in the field of psychiatry in the province of Quebec.

“Presently, therapists and doctors diagnose mental disorders with traditional clinical methods such as patient report and observation,” says Martin Lepage, PhD, principal researcher at BIG. “Eventually, with brain imaging, we’ll be able to identify biological markers for specific psychiatric diseases. Such markers will be used for pre-clinical diagnosis, to evaluate disease progression, and to assess treatment effectiveness.”

The creation of BIG has dramatically increased the number of research projects being conducted at the Douglas Hospital Research Centre. “One year ago, there was only one researcher and a few students using brain imaging. Today, we have five grant-funded researchers, two postdoctoral fellows, five research assistants and nineteen students – all working on a wide variety of ground-breaking research projects in the field of psychiatry,” explains Lepage.

These areas of investigation include aging and Alzheimer Disease, schizophrenia, firstepisode psychosis, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Post-Traumatic Syndrome Disorder, spatial navigation, normal memory functions, emotions, and brain volumetry (see attached notes on BIG’s main research projects).

A Network of Institutions
Brain imaging at the Douglas Hospital Research Centre is possible due to a partnership with the Montreal Neurological Institute (where Douglas Hospital patients and/or subjects are sent to have their brains scanned) and McGill University. Once taken, the images are sent via a high speed connection to BIG’s laboratory at the Douglas Hospital.

This kind of network was first envisioned 7 years ago by the Montreal Consortium for Brain Imaging Research (MCBIR), a group interested in studying all aspects of the brain. The group includes the Douglas Hospital, the Montreal Neurological Institute, the Jewish General Hospital and McGill University, amongst others.

Since the creation of the network, and the $23 million grant from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation that made it possible, the Douglas Hospital Research Centre’s Brain Imaging Group is the first - and so far only – group to be connected to and working with the Montreal Neurological Institute.
 

Information

Florence Meney
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