Grant: Planning and Dissemination Grants - Institute/Initiative Community Support

Real-world health data are a powerful but underutilized resource for improving cancer research and clinical trials in Canada. Unlocking their potential requires harmonized, interoperable data infrastructure that enables researchers to work across institutions and provinces without compromising patient privacy. The Observational Medical Outcomes Partnership (OMOP) Common Data Model (CDM), maintained by the international OHDSI collaborative, provides exactly this - a proven open-science standard that enables federated, multi-site observational research across diverse health data sources. Adoption of OMOP in Canada is growing but fragmented. Institutions are independently undertaking OMOP implementation projects, often duplicating effort and encountering the same Canadian-specific challenges without a shared community of practice. OHDSI Canada was formally established in 2026 as Canada's national OHDSI chapter precisely to address this gap. Building directly on the successful inaugural Pan-Canadian OMOP Engagement Event held in November 2025, which convened over 100 stakeholders from across Canada and confirmed strong national appetite for a coordinated approach, this proposal requests $10,000 in support of the OHDSI Canada 2026 Symposium. The two-day event (Oct/Nov 2026 date TBD) will bring together approximately 100 participants from academia, hospitals, provincial health data centres, government, industry, and community organizations. Day 1 delivers hands-on training workshops; Day 2 features a collaborator showcase, guest speakers, and a structured consensus-building session to produce a pan-Canadian OMOP roadmap. Outputs include a shared national roadmap, publicly available workshop resources, and a strengthened, diverse Canadian OMOP community.