The 21st Annual Child Health Research Days took place last month, welcoming more than 200 attendees and thirteen speakers from across Canada. The week kicked off with the abstract competition, which saw nearly 90 submissions covering a range of topics relating to child health research.

This year’s CHRD conference included presentations from world-renowned researchers local to our community, as well as presenters from Ontario, Alberta, and British Columbia. Some highlights included our yearly Dr. Goodbear’s Den competition, which featured six finalists who presented their work to the team of judges.

Dr. Goodbear’s Den participants:

Michaela Bourque
Nolan De Leon
Garry Goel

Vaibhav Varna
Hannah Marie Ziegler-Blair
Danielle Isfeld

The awards dinner was the perfect ending to the week at the beautiful Qualico Family Centre. We were proud to highlight award winners from the abstract competition, as well as the finalists from Dr. Goodbear’s Den. We were also excited to continue with the CHRIM Excellence Awards, which began last year, in an effort to recognize those in our community in the categories of Trail Blazer, Lab Master, Rising Star, and CHRIM Champion.

Thank you to everyone who presented, participated, organized or attended this years Child Health Research Days, and we can’t wait to welcome you again next year for CHRD 2026!

CHRD Award Winners

Undergraduate Students

Honourable mention – Harleen Kaur
Honourable mention- Fiona Fan
Bronze – Jewel Paskaruk
Silver – Bianca Regenio
Gold – Naomi Gebru

Masters Students

Honourable mention- Morgan Hanson-Oliveira
Honourable mention- Nicolas Leclerc
Bronze – Runqi Lin
Silver – Shanella Senadhiraja
Gold – Nuzhat Tabassum

PhD Students

Honourable mentions – Kaden Baskerville and Ghazale Farjam
Bronze – Nicholas Klassen
Silver – Julia Cerato
Silver – Lydia Amooga
Gold – Khushali Trivedi

Post-Doctoral Fellow/Resident

Gold – Vanessa Tomas (pictured with co-presenting author Melanie Sheldon)

Non-Trainee

Honourable mention – Megan Bale-Nick (not pictured, co-presenting author Becky Conia) and
Honourable mention- Azadeh Dalvand
Bronze – Joanna Johnson- Audu
Silver – Dina Mostafa
Gold – Madyson Shauman