First
Nations

Our mission

Overall Objectives

The overarching objective of the Canadian Alliance for Healthy Hearts and Minds (CAHHM) cohort is to investigate how the community-level environment is associated with individual health behaviours and the presence and progression of chronic disease risk factors and chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease (CVD) and cancer.

01.

Determine the frequency of risk factors for CVD and cancer among Fist Nations people from diverse First Nations communities in Canada.

02.

Characterize the availability and access to primary care screening, and management of chronic diseases and their risk factors.

03.

Determine the burden of subclinical cerebrovascular and cardiac disease and ectopic adipose tissue using brain, heart, carotid, and abdomen MRI.

04.

Characterize the contextual factor profile of each community and understand how community level environment is associated with individual health behaviours and risk factors.

Information collected in the indigenous cohort will be used to assist communities to develop local management strategies for chronic disease, and can be used collectively to understand the contextual, environmental, socioeconomic, and biological determinants of differences in health status in harmony with First Nations ways of knowing.