Addictions research receives $4 million from CIHR

David Hodgins UCalgary files The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) has awarded the Canadian Research Initiative in Substance Misuse (CRISM) a $4 million operating grant to further research that's improving addictions practice and policy across the country. Initially formed in 2015 , CRISM includes thousands of members across Canada - researchers, service providers, policymakers, and people with lived experience of substance use - who are organized in five regional nodes: B.C., the Prairies, Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada. The latest funding will help CRISM share information across the country, says Dr. David Hodgins, PhD, head of both the Addictive Behaviours Lab in the Department of Psychology in the Faculty of Arts, and CRISM's Prairie node. "We've been operating essentially as five separate nodes with lots of collaboration and co-operation," he says. "This additional funding is to work better and more collaboratively. It will help CRISM be a truly national organization." Much of CRISM's work is providing evidence to support people using opioids and other illicit drugs, which Hodgins calls "an ongoing public health crisis." In Alberta in 2023, at least  1,706 people died of opioid overdoses - four people a day. Hodgins and his team have found strong evidence for "dual treatment" for opioid use disorder, employing methadone or another medication to replace the person's use of opioids.