As Kelowna’s homepage for news, CASTANET reaches many individuals within the Okanagan. Read their story “UBCO trial linking stroke patients with rehabilitation via the internet” to learn more about our TRAIL study and patient partner Jennifer Monaghan!
An evening of friendly competition and heartfelt purpose at the Lawn Bowling Social Fundraiser in support of The Canadian Women’s Heart Health Alliance. Hosted at the beautiful Kelowna Lawn Bowling Club in City Park, this casual summer night out included lawn bowling, a silent auction, raffle prizes, and a BBQ, with all proceeds supporting life-saving research, education, and awareness through the Canadian Women’s Heart Health Alliance!
The event was led by our patient partner, Jennifer Monaghan, a passionate women’s heart health advocate. At just 43, Jennifer experienced a life-altering stroke and diagnosis of cardiomyopathy—despite having no prior symptoms or risk factors. Her recovery journey led her to advocacy and volunteering, and she now channels her story into action, awareness, and support for others. Learn more about Jennifer’s story here: https://www.interiorhealth.ca/stories/heart-failure-heart-function-jennifers-story
Congratulations to Dianne Kim, who recently completed her Bachelor of Science degree with a psychology major and biology minor! Thank you for all of your amazing work! Best of luck during your graduate studies at the University of Alberta!
Congratulations to Dr. Elise Wiley, who received two prestigious postdoctoral fellowship awards from Michael Smith Health Research BC and StrokeCOG!
Dr. Wiley is looking at one-year self-management and health resource use trajectories among individuals who have had a recent stroke. Her primary research area is chronic disease self-management after stroke with a particular focus on health resource utilization and sex-based considerations.
Dr. Wiley received the Michael Smith Health Research BC trainee award for her work in ‘Exploring the natural history of chronic disease self-management and health resource utilization after stroke’.
Additionally, she received the StokeCOG clinical trail training program award for her work in ‘Optimizing stroke recovery in women through accessible modalities of health service delivery: A sex-and-gender-based analysis of the TeleRehabilitation with Aims to Improve Lower Extremity Recovery (TRAIL) Clinical Trail’.
Congratulations to Dr. Kenny Noguchi on recently winning the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council’s (SSHRC) Postdoctoral Fellowship Award! This highly prestigious award provides fellows with $140,000 over two years.
Michelle’s manuscript, ‘Experiences of health professional students delivering a community-outreach teleheAlth program for COVID education and Health promotion to older adults’ has been accepted into the Journal of Medical Education and Curricular Development! Congratulations Michelle!
Brain Awareness Week 2025, hosted by the NIMBL Lab at UBC Okanagan, was a great success! This event was a no-cost, community-engaged research event where UBC Okanagan researchers focused on anything ‘brain-related’ and opened their doors in an effort to bridge the gap between the ongoing academic research and the patient population or interested community members.
Dr. Brodie Sakakibara was the keynote speaker for the event and spoke about clinical research trials investigating innovative post-stroke rehabilitation interventions that are accessible to the Okanagan patient population.
Pictured: Dr. Brodie Sakakibara participating in a debate about The use of AI/Virtual Technology for Stroke Rehabilitation – Is the use of telerehabilitation in healthcare a helpful panacea or open pandora’s box?
The Canadian Stroke Congress is Canada’s go-to meeting in stroke research and innovation, bringing together national and international leaders in the field. This year’s conference agenda included a lecture on AI Across the Stroke Care Continuum, a Women and Stroke symposium, the Hnatyshyn & Nieboer Lectureships, Canadian Stroke Trials Update, Poster and Oral Presentations, the inaugural Dale Corbett Translational Lectureship and more.
Welcome to our three new lab team members, Elise, Jacob, and Kenny! Elise and Kenny both join the lab as Post-Doctoral fellows and Jacob joins the lab as a PhD student! We are excited to work alongside you!
Welcome to our two new Research Assistants, Dianne and Sarah! We are so excited to have them join the team!
