The Victoria Hospitals Foundation (VHF) works in partnership with Island Health to enable donations to every area of care at Royal Jubilee Hospital, Victoria General Hospital, and the Gorge Road Health Centre. As Island Health’s charitable partner, we raise donations for medical equipment, special projects, education, and research. As a registered charity, our charitable registration number is: 10793 5637 RR0001.
In 2023/24, over $15.4 million was raised to support our hospitals, including gifts from over 6,600 donors. Since 1989, the Victoria Hospitals Foundation has raised more than $209 million to benefit our hospitals. Our community has generously funded thousands of pieces of urgently needed medical equipment and special projects to help these hospitals provide care to all 885,000+ residents of Vancouver Island.
Royal Columbian Hospital is a leading critical care hospital, serving a population of more than 1.8 million people — one in three British Columbians.
Providing the highest level of care to some of the province’s most critically ill and injured, Royal Columbian Hospital is the only hospital in BC with trauma, cardiac, neurosciences, high-risk maternity and neonatal intensive care on one site.
Building on a strong tradition of caring and community support, Royal Columbian Hospital Foundation was established in 1978 to raise funds for the hospital’s first CT Scanner. Since then, thousands of individuals, businesses, community groups and foundations have provided generous support each year to help fight for British Columbians in their most critical moments.
By 2036, it is estimated that 1 in 5 Canadians will have a disability. One of the biggest barriers that people with disabilities face is a lack of physical access to places where they live, work and play.
Established in 1988 to continue Rick Hansen’s dream of creating an accessible and inclusive world, the Rick Hansen Foundation has funded spinal cord injury research, raised awareness, and removed social and physical barriers to help people with disabilities live to their full potential. Its goal is to make Canada fully accessible.
Provincial Health Services Authority (PHSA) is one of six BC health authorities. Its primary role is to ensure that BC residents have access to a coordinated network of high-quality specialized health-care services.
PHSA operates provincial agencies, including BC Children’s Hospital and BC Transplant, but PHSA is also responsible for specialized provincial health services like trauma and chest surgery, which are delivered in a number of locations across the province. Through BC Emergency Health Services, (BCEHS), PHSA oversees the BC Ambulance Service, Patient Transfer Network and Trauma Services BC.
By planning, coordinating and evaluating specialized health services, PHSA is working with the other health authorities across BC to provide equitable and cost-effective health care for people who need provincial services like cancer treatment, management of a complex mental health problem or cardiac care.
Providence Research is the research enterprise of Providence Health Care (PHC).
In affiliation with the University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser University, Providence Research is host to four distinct research centres and a number of independent clinical research groups.
Providence Research finds solutions to challenges that arise from PHC’s care settings through high-quality research, including laboratory, clinical and applied outcomes research. Integrated with patient care and teaching, research spans more than 30 programs and disciplines. Areas of focus directly align with PHC’s populations of emphasis: HIV/AIDS; urban health and addictions; heart and lung disease; kidney disease; mental health; and specialized needs in aging.
Along with mentoring and training new talent, Providence Research promotes interdisciplinary and interprofessional collaborations, knowledge transfer, and partnerships with patients and families and health leaders in the community.
Providence Research also partners with MSFHR to co-fund research via the Centre for Heart Lung Innovation (HLI) and the Centre For Health Evaluation And Outcome Sciences (CHÉOS).
Plantiga’s mission is to democratize gait analytics.
Plantiga has developed sensor insoles and an analytics platform to measure human movement in the real world. The company’s research focus is connecting gait (how human beings walk and run) to health outcomes and injury risk.
To drive its research efforts, Plantiga has developed “Plantiga Labs” — a mobile gait assessment laboratory. Plantiga Labs offers free movement assessments and is currently building one of the world’s largest databases of lower limb injuries.
The Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies draws together scholars from UBC and around the world to engage in deep and unconstrained research into some of the most profound questions and challenges facing humanity. The Institute seeks to encourage highly innovative, creative and unexpected scholarship through wide-ranging explorations between disciplines, including the creative and performing arts.
The activities of the Institute also contribute to the cultural enrichment of UBC and the wider community through regular lecture series and artistic events. Since its founding in 1996, the Institute has created a community of scholars at UBC and beyond, including partner institutions.
The Centre for Heart Lung Innovation (HLI) was established as the Pulmonary Research Laboratory in 1977 by Drs. James Hogg and Peter Pare. Since then, it has grown dramatically in scope, size and worldwide impact.
Basic and clinician scientists work together in an exciting multidisciplinary environment to address vital issues in heart, lung and critical care disease. Situated within Providence Health Care’s St. Paul’s Hospital, a University of British Columbia teaching hospital, the HLI is a translational research centre using basic molecular and cellular research discoveries to develop innovative approaches to prevent and treat human disease through complementary and connected clinical research.
The HLI focuses on developing solutions to diseases that are major causes of morbidity, mortality, and societal costs in Canada and worldwide. These include atherosclerosis and heart failure, emphysema and other chronic pulmonary diseases, severe infections, and multiple organ failure. The centre seeks out the underlying causes in order to develop strategies for prevention and treatment. Basic discoveries are linked to improved health care through clinical research and teaching, and by translating new knowledge into clinical practice at St. Paul’s Hospital and around the world.
HLI is one of several renowned research centres based at Providence Research.
The BC Centre on Substance Use is a provincially networked organization with a mandate to develop, help implement, and evaluate evidence-based approaches to substance use and addiction.
BCCSU seeks to improve the integration of best practices and care across the continuum of substance use through the collaborative development of evidence-based policies, guidelines and standards. With the support of the Province of British Columbia, BCCSU aims to transform substance use policies and care by translating research into education and care guidance, thereby serving all British Columbians.
The BCCSU seeks to achieve these goals through integrated activities of its three core functions: research and evaluation, education and training, and clinical care guidance.
The BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS (BC-CfE) is Canada’s largest HIV/AIDS research, treatment and education facility and is internationally recognized as an innovative world leader in combating HIV/AIDS and related diseases.
BC-CfE is based at St. Paul’s Hospital, Providence Health Care, a teaching hospital of the University of British Columbia. The BC-CfE works in close collaboration with key provincial stakeholders, including government, health authorities, health-care providers, academics from other institutions, and the community to decrease the health burden of HIV and AIDS.
By developing, monitoring and disseminating comprehensive research and treatment programs for HIV and related illnesses, the BC-CfE helps improve the health of British Columbians.
