FYI ----- Forwarded by Domenica Lam/fs/YorkU on 05/17/2011 07:19 PM ----- Daniel Perez <[log in to unmask]> 05/17/2011 07:18 PM To GRASP - public health club <[log in to unmask]>, "GRASP Discussion & Announcements" <[log in to unmask]> cc Subject 2011 GRASP Speaker Series, Final Presenter: Dr. Lyle Palmer - May 25th, 2011 Wednesday May 25th, 2011 4:00-5:00 PM Room 320 Bethune College Hello GRASP & York University community members, Just a reminder that next Wednesday, May 25th is our final speaker in our 2011 series. Dr. Lyle Palmer will be visiting York to talk about the Ontario Health Study, a major new research project that will provide unique longitudinal health data on the Ontario population. The Ontario Health Study will be the most extensively characterized community-based cohort study ever undertaken in Canada and will dramatically enhance Ontario research capacities and competitiveness across many different disciplines. We would like to invite all GRASP and York community members to come out to this important talk to hear more about what promises to be one of our most important public health research resources in the decades to come. If you were one talk short of your GRASP certificate of attendance, now is the time to get caught up and earn your certificate! This is our final talk of the year, and will give attendees a chance to hear more about a highly innovative project - I strongly encourage everyone who can make it to come out. Light refreshments will be provided. Please share this email widely! As always, feel free to email me at [log in to unmask] with any questions. Best regards, Daniel Perez GRASP Communications Abstract: This presentation will deliver an overview of the Ontario Health Study (OHS), a major new provincial research enabling platform. The OHS is a big ‐vision science project aimed at establishing a large, population‐based, longitudinal cohort study of volunteers drawn from the entire adult population of Ontario residents (~9.5 million people). The OHS will be the biggest single cohort study ever attempted in North America, and the first major epidemiological survey to be conducted completely online. The Study will establish a unique data resource to assist in developing research and health policy programs, and a framework for bi‐directional information interchange with a significant proportion of the adult population of Ontario. The Ontario Health Study will investigate multi‐dimensional environmental, social, behavioural and genetic factors underlying health and disease, and will focus on understanding chronic disease through the adult life‐course and on providing new translational capacity for Canada. The Study will identify pre‐morbid, clinical and lifestyle risk factors for disease, disability, loss of function and reduced quality of life. Study results will influence future clinical care, personal behaviour and health policy. Speaker Bio: Lyle Palmer, PhD FRSS FAIM: Executive Scientific Director, Ontario Health Study Principal Investigator (Ontario), The Canadian Partnership for Tomorrow Project; Senior Principal Investigator and Director of Genetic Epidemiology Program, Ontario Institute for Cancer Research, Toronto; Professor of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto; Senior Investigator, Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute, Toronto; Senior Scientist, Cancer Care Ontario, Toronto. Lyle Palmer recently relocated to Toronto. He is the executive scientific director of the Ontario Health Study. Before moving to Canada in July 2010, Professor Palmer was the foundation Winthrop Chair in Genetic Epidemiology and the founding director of the Centre for Genetic Epidemiology & Biostatistics at the University of Western Australia, where he was also a professor in the Schools of Medicine & Pharmacology and Population Health. Professor Palmer is an internationally renowned geneticist and epidemiologist with interests in cancer, asthma, CVD, sleep apnea, fetal growth regulation, diabetes and methodological research.