Community Knowledge Centre - Toronto Community Foundation

About this organization

Mission

To beat arthritis and autoimmune diseases.

History of Organization

Founded in 1998, the Arthritis & Autoimmunity Research Centre (AARC), whose scientists work at the University Health Network and Mt. Sinai Hospital is North America’s most comprehensive collaborative dedicated to arthritis research. Its disciplined and dedicated minds are working toward the prevention, treatment and cure for arthritis and autoimmune disorders. The Toronto research centre is certainly Canada’s largest – and one of the few worldwide – to concentrate exclusively on arthritis and autoimmune disorders.

AARC brings together an elite group of over 50 world-leading experts – rheumatologists, orthopaedic surgeons, immunologists, chemists, bioengineers, medical imaging specialists, geneticists, biostaticians, computational scientists, and population health researchers –working to create a better future for millions of affected Canadians.

The AARC Foundation is the primary philanthropic funder of this very special Centre, always seeking new ways to ensure this critical research continues to develop and thrive and to beat arthritis.

Accolades and Accomplishments

The Arthritis & Autoimmunity Research Centre is the largest centre of its kind in Canada.

AARC scientists are acknowledged for their achievements with scholarly awards and successes in competitive grant funding. AARC Investigators published more papers and were more cited than high-impact peer groups and have increasing proportions of high-impact papers.

Recently, the BioEngineering group’s Microfabrication Centre was opened in the T. Robert Beamish Family Convergence Centre. While the quality of the research taking place in this laboratory has always been world-class, the engineering component is unique and transformative. This Centre was made possible through a generous pledge by the Beamish Family and is now one of the most dynamic research environments in North America with many people of different disciplines and expertise collaborating to find research breakthroughs.

Programs

>Research Programs
>Education & Awareness

Research

The Arthritis & Autoimmunity Research Centre Foundation serves to raise funds in order to ensure the best patient outcomes and to end the pain and suffering for the over 4.2 million Canadians who suffer from arthritis.

Education & Awareness

The Arthritis & Autoimmunity Research Centre Foundation provides educational opportunities to Torontonians via patient forums on specific diseases such as psoriatic arthritis, scleroderma and ankylosing spondylitis.

Research Programs

• Basic & Applied research focuses on understanding how the cells in our bodies work & how genes make our cells do different things, what effect different cell components such as proteins and enzymes have on other cells, and what can happen if one or more of those components are altered.

• Clinical research helps to determine which therapies will work best for individual patients. The integration of the fields of genetics, therapeutics and outcomes research will ultimately lead to targeting the right drugs to the right people more quickly and will have a major impact on the health of individuals in Toronto and beyond.

• Community research focuses on the population at large with four components: employment, coping and adaptation, life-span development and successful aging, and methodologies & outcomes. This research area determines how arthritis affects the society at large in both economic and sociological terms.

Funding and Program Partners

We have many generous donors throughout the GTA, without their support we would be unable to provide funding for researchers to help beat arthritis.

Program Impact

One in six Canadians is living with some form of arthritis. AARC scientists believe that they are closer than ever to finding the critical answers. Our researchers are committed to work focused on early diagnoses by identifying disease predictors.

Early disease intervention could mean far less joint deterioration and more simple treatment programs leading to an improved quality of life making possible holding a job, raising a family and planning basic activities.

Toronto's Vital Signs® indicator(s) addressed by Program

“Out of an estimated 2006 Aboriginal population of close to 27,000 people in the Toronto Region, over half (58%) of First Nations adults and 55% of Métis were living with at least one diagnosed chronic illnesses, the most common conditions being respiratory problems, high blood pressure, heart problems or the effects of a stroke (22%) or arthritis and rheumatism (27% of the Métis population, compared with 15.4% of the total Toronto population).”

(Toronto’s Vital Signs®, 2009)

Participant Vignette

• “Over the past twenty years, I’ve been on every drug therapy available, undergone nine operations and watched this disease take an extreme toll on my body. Because of research, someone diagnosed today will never have to experience the tremendous pain and joint destruction that many of us have lived with.”
• “I was first diagnosed when I was 10 years old. I went from playing sports at a highly competitive level, to not being able to walk. I was bedridden for four years. Thanks to the treatments I’ve received, I’m now able to run an ultra-marathon.”
• “AARC’s surgeons replaced all my knuckles, fused my thumb, and straightened my fingers that were going out in every direction. I am now virtually pain-free.”
• “When my son was born, I couldn’t hold him. There were times when the pain was so bad I felt like I wanted to die. AARC has made a huge impact – it has given me back a life.”
• “The therapy has had an incredible impact on my life and my ability to cope with this disease…I literally felt better within three hours of my first treatment.”
• “In my early twenties, I was studying voice at the University of Toronto. I developed an earache that lasted for months. Soon I experienced hearing loss and was no longer able to sing. Like all autoimmune disorders, your own body becomes the enemy.”

Education & Awareness

Patient Forums offer those who are affected, including friends and family, the opportunity to hear from leading scientists and the new rising stars in the field of rheumatology about recent advances in treatment and the latest research.

Funding and Program Partners

We acknowledge support from the pharmaceutical sector as well as the doctors who make the forums possible and available to anyone who is interested to learn more about arthritis and autoimmune conditions.

Program Impact

With knowledge comes power - the power to become involved in learning more about managing the disease and making informed choices with your primary care physician or specialist. Patients and their families learn the newest treatments and therapies and are given hope when learning about what is on the horizon.

Toronto's Vital Signs® indicator(s) addressed by Program

“Out of an estimated 2006 Aboriginal population of close to 27,000 people in the Toronto Region, over half (58%) of First Nations adults and 55% of Métis were living with at least one diagnosed chronic illnesses, the most common conditions being respiratory problems, high blood pressure, heart problems or the effects of a stroke (22%) or arthritis and rheumatism (27% of the Métis population, compared with 15.4% of the total Toronto population).”

(Toronto’s Vital Signs®, 2009)

Participant Vignette

• “It was very helpful to see the visuals for the various stages of scleroderma. This topic is so vast, there is still a lot for me to learn and understand. Thanks for providing this opportunity to the public.”
• “Most helpful. Watching my sister-in-law battle scleroderma there didn’t appear to be hope. Today there seems to be more understanding of the disease and therefore more hope for control of this disease.”
• “Excellent lecture! Extremely informative and exceptionally well delivered and organized. I learned a lot – motivated to learn more.”
• “Better than excellent.”