About the Program
Mental Health Research 4 Kids is an innovative mental health research program focused on children and adolescents ages 0-18 years old. The program is led by researchers at the University of Calgary and the Alberta Children's Hospital Research Institute and made possible by generous community support through the Alberta Children's Hospital Foundation. The program is linked to The Summit: Marian & Jim Sinneave Centre for Youth Resilience to promote a direct pipeline from discovery to care in one setting.
Meet the Team
Dr. Susan Graham
Susan is a child clinical psychologist and a developmental scientist. She is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Calgary and the Director of the Owerko Centre for Neurodevelopment and Child Mental Health. Her research focuses on language and cognitive development during infancy and preschool years.
Dr. Graham is one of the Program Leads for the Mental Health Research 4 Kids program at the CCAMH.
Dr. Paul Arnold
Paul is a Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist with an expertise in paediatric OCD and a neurobiology researcher. He is a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Calgary and the inaugural Director of the Mathison Centre for Mental Health Research & Education. His research examines how genes and the environment interact to influence the development of child neuropsychiatric disorders.
Dr. Arnold is one of the Program Leads for the Mental Health Research 4 Kids program at the CCAMH. He also leads the Measurement-Based Care and the Database projects for the program.
Dr. Signe Bray
Signe is a cognitive human neuroscience researcher. She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Radiology at the University of Calgary and the Scientific Director of the Child and Adolescent Imaging (CAIR) Program. Her research uses magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to better understand how brain networks develop, how the brain changes during development, and how neurodevelopmental conditions affect brain structure and function.
Dr. Bray oversees the development, operation, and performance of the Mental Health Research 4 Kids program at the CCAMH. She also leads the Discovery Cohort study.
Dr. Suzanne Tough
Suzanne is an epidemiologist and maternal and child health researcher. She is a Professor in the Departments of Paediatrics and Community Health Sciences at the University of Calgary and has held a policy fellowship and a number of scientific leadership roles. Her research aims to understand maternal well-being, child development, and associated relationships across the life course for optimal outcomes.
Dr. Tough leads the All our Families Cohort and brings her extensive expertise leading large, multi-modal longitudinal cohort studies to the Mental Health Research 4 Kids program at the CCAMH.
Dr. Scott Patten
Scott is an epidemiologist and psychiatrist. He is a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Calgary and the Cuthbertson-Fisher Chair in Pediatric Mental Health. His research focuses on the epidemiology of common mental health disorders (especially depression) and the medical-psychiatric disorders that commonly co-occur in the Canadian population.
Dr. Patten is the mental health lead for the Brain and Mental Health Clinics program and brings his extensive experience with linking to large administrative databases to the Mental Health Research 4 Kids program at the CCAMH.
Dr. Whitney Hindmarch
Whitney is a cell and developmental biologist and the program manager for the Mental Health Research 4 Kids at the CCAMH. She is responsible for program development, day-to-day operations, and monitoring program progress.
