Congratulations to RID Program Investigators Dr. Elisabeth McClymont and Dr. Jeffrey Wong on receiving 2025 Women’s Health Research Institute Catalyst Grants! These catalyst grants are awarded annually through a collaboration between the Women’s Health Research Institute at BC Women’s Hospital and the BC Women’s Health Foundation, to seven BC-based researchers who are working to advance the field of women’s and/or newborn health.
Dr. Elisabeth McClymont was awarded funding for a project entitled “Leveraging HPV Screening Data to Improve Cervical Cancer Prevention in Women Living with HIV“, which will use screening data from the newly-implemented HPV-based cervical cancer screening program in BC, to determine the distribution of HPV types, rates of colposcopy referral, rates of successful colposcopy, and HPV types that are associated with faster progression to precancer/cancer in women and people living with a cervix with HIV (WLWH). The WLWH population are disproportionately affected by HPV-related cancers, with cervical cancer risk being 5x higher in this population then in those without HIV. Thus, this work will provide important insight into optimizing HPV/cervical cancer detection in this population and helping to work towards eliminating cervical cancer in Canada.
Dr Jeffrey Wong was awarded funding for a project entitled “SHIELD-RSV Study of HIV-Exposed pregnancies and transplacental antibody Delivery following RSVpreF“, which will enroll 20 participants, who are pregnant women or people living with HIV, who will receive maternal vaccination for RSV (RSVpreF) during their pregnancy. The maternal pre- and post- vaccination RSV antibody levels, infant RSV antibody levels, birth outcome, vaccine safety data and parental attitudes towards RSV vaccination will all be collected from participants. This data will help to answer a critical gap in knowledge regarding the antibody response of pregnant women and people with HIV who are given the RSV vaccine, as well as the ability of these RSV antibodies to cross the placenta in these pregnancies, as women and people with HIV were excluded from the clinical trials for this vaccine. This information will help clinicians and parents to make more informed decisions regarding maternal vaccination for RSV during pregnancy.
These grants will be instrumental in allowing this work to be done, so we both thank the WHRI for their support of the RID Program’s work and again offer our sincerest congratulations to Dr. McClymont and Dr. Wong!
For more information on the awarded projects, click here!