Celebrating Research and Philanthropy at the MGHF’s Impact & Innovation Evening

From left to right: Sepehr Madani, Dr. Ahmed Aoude, Naghmeh Bandari, PhD; Amir Hooshiar, PhD; Louise Fast.

Visionary researchers, generous philanthropists, and medical leaders filled Maison Alcan in downtown Montreal for the Montreal General Hospital Foundation (MGHF)’s inaugural Impact & Innovation Evening. This exclusive event showcased the impact of the Foundation’s support of research and innovation and recognized the 67 recipients of this year’s MGHF Research Awards.

Thanks to our generous donors, these award recipients will collectively benefit from $2M in funding, advancing projects ranging from personalized cancer care to brain and mental health, medicine, surgery, healthy living, and more.

The inspiring soirée demonstrated why supporting research is essential and how philanthropic funding makes a real difference to researchers.

From left to right: Dr. Hayaki Uchino, Satoko and Richard Ingram, Stephanie Riddell, Dr. Masayuki Fukumoto.

Why research matters: stories behind the impact of your support.

After an introduction by MC Annie DeMelt (who hosts our Taking the Pulse interview series), the Foundation’s President & CEO Stephanie Riddell took the stage, followed by Vice President, Development Alexander King. The enthusiastic audience welcomed Dr. Indra Gupta, Deputy Director of the McGill University Health Centre’s Research Institute (RI-MUHC), which is our main partner for funding medical research; Amir Hooshiar, PhD, director of the Surgical Performance Enhancement and Robotics (SuPER) Centre; and orthopedic oncology and spine surgeon Dr. Ahmed Aoude, who presented his surgical AR and robotics startup, MedAlign AR. Dr. Aoude was an engineer before becoming a doctor and now performs complex, life-saving surgeries. He is a spokesperson for our Together Against Cancer campaign (a special collaboration of the Cedars Cancer Foundation and Montreal General Hospital Foundation).

The MGHF supports innovation, from transformative research to health-tech startups.

A rapt audience enjoys the MGHF’s inaugural Impact & Innovation Evening.

Health-tech startups were in focus thanks to booths helmed by AFX Medical (which uses AI to identify metastases to make brain cancer treatment faster and more precise) and HoloRay (a company that’s revolutionizing medical education, diagnosis, and treatment planning with mixed reality technology, founded by Amir Hooshiar, PhD). These startups are members of the Clinical Innovation Platform (CLIP) at the RI-MUHC, a key partner in our Foundation’s impact investment program.

For the Foundation’s philanthropic, research, and medical communities, this was an opportunity to celebrate together, build meaningful connections, and discover transformative projects poised to transform the future of healthcare – and meet the visionary minds behind them. Guests heard about the impact our Research Awards had on some previous recipients, who have achieved amazing things, and some award recipients met their benefactors in person.

The Montreal General Hospital Foundation is proud that approximately half of our annual funding goes to research and innovation. Thanks to our donors, we’re honoured to fund transformative initiatives to impact the lives of patients across the province and beyond. Let’s transform healthcare together!

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Photos: @ Thierry du Bois