UNB News
News and stories from one of Canada’s top universities

The University of New Brunswick (UNB) will provide leading research in the health care and public policy sectors, thanks to generous support from The Jarislowsky Foundation.

During a reception Monday at the University Club in Montreal, UNB celebrated a $1 million gift from The Jarislowsky Foundation that established The Jarislowsky Chair in Interprofessional Patient-Centred Care. Also during the event, UNB announced an additional gift of $500,000 from The Jarislowsky Foundation for a postdoctoral fellowship focused on health care public policy.

 “The Foundation committed to these projects because they are fundamentally important to making New Brunswick a better province,” said Dr. Stephen Jarislowsky, president of The Jarislowsky Foundation. “We anticipate this support for these worthwhile projects will provide a catalyst for applied research and policy implementation.”

Dr. Jarislowsky is chairman of the board of the Montreal-based investment firm Jarislowsky, Fraser Limited, one of Canada’s largest and most successful investment management companies. Through his influence, Dr. Jarislowsky and The Jarislowsky Foundation have established 26 endowed chairs in a variety of disciplines across the country, including medicine, public sector management and business.

The new postdoctoral fellowship, which is part of an initiative to honour Dr. Purdy Crawford, will focus on the development of evidence-based public policy in health care and will build on the health research at UNB and The Jarislowsky Chair. Many others have chosen to honour Dr. Crawford and Dr. Jarislowsky’s contribution assists in establishing a $1 million endowment, thus ensuring the research will be carried on in perpetuity.

Dr. Shelley Doucet (BN‘05, PhD‘10), the inaugural Jarislowsky Chair in Interprofessional Patient-Centred Care, will lead an ongoing research initiative aimed at developing and evaluating new interprofessional community-based primary health-care models that are patient-centred.

This growing field of study encourages collaboration among health and social care providers across multiple settings to improve patient care and better manage public health resources to sustain the delivery of health care in the future.

“The University of New Brunswick is a leader in health research, producing some of the best research anywhere, by any standard,” said Dr. Eddy Campbell, UNB’s president and vice-chancellor. “We are well positioned as a leader in New Brunswick to affect real change to make a positive impact on society.”

In establishing The Jarislowsky Chair in Interprofessional Patient-Centred Care, The Jarislowsky Foundation’s gift of $1 million was matched by $500,000 contributions from both the New Brunswick Health Research Foundation and the Sir James Dunn Foundation.