Improved population health

Reducing gaps in health through improved health equity

Addressing public health challenges

“I came from the streets, an EMS paramedic, and I always thought that we did a lot of the (public health) work... What I learned as I matured, especially being involved with the O’Brien Institute, is that public health policies are critically important to improving well-being and addressing health challenges. It’s the longer-term policy decisions — which way we go as a community, how we treat one another, how we look after our people, that matter in a pandemic, or in an opioid crisis.”

- Former Calgary Emergency Management Agency chief, Tom Sampson

Improved population health

The O’Brien Institute’s leading edge research programs in population health and inequities focus on the health of the entire population, taking into account the environmental, social, and economic factors that determine our health potential. Reducing gaps in health through improved health equity, especially for vulnerable children and youth, leads to healthier populations, providing benefits to all members of our communities.

We research new ways to improve health and prevent disease in the general population. Some examples of this include:

new vaccination programs to prevent the spread of communicable diseases
food policies to prevent chronic conditions such as obesity, diabetes, hypertension
design of healthy cities to prevent the same chronic conditions.

The O'Brien Institute and its members are part of a variety of research-enabling relationships.