Photo: Don Erhardt

Canada’s largest integrated brain centre officially opens today, uniting research and patient care to change the way brain disorders are treated and studied.

The Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health (DMCBH), a partnership between the University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health, unites under one roof research and clinical expertise in neuroscience, psychiatry and neurology in order to accelerate discovery and translate new knowledge into better treatment and prevention strategies.

The DMCBH is home to clinics for Multiple Sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, depression and other brain disorders. Innovative programs that integrate research and patient care, led by Canada’s top researchers – including Canada Research Chairs, BC Leading Edge Endowment Fund Leadership Chairs and a Canada Excellence Research Chair – will offer British Columbians improved access to treatments and clinical trials.

The DMCBH will also house research labs in concussion, stroke, addiction and healthy aging, and serve as a venue for the education and training of hundreds of medical students and graduate students.

Affecting one in three Canadians from early childhood to old age, brain dysfunction costs more than $30 billion annually and is expected to overtake heart disease and cancer as the leading cause of death and disability in Canada by 2020.

Visit UBC News (news.ubc.ca/category/cbh) for a special series on research at DMCBH. Photographs of the DMCBH are available at news.ubc.ca/2014/02/27/cbh/.

To learn more about DMCBH, visit www.centreforbrainhealth.ca.