PhD student Renato Barbosa dos Santos receives EPIC-AT fellowship
Photo credit: Rohit Kulkarni
Renato Barbosa dos Santos, a fourth-year PhD student under the supervision of Prof. Nancy Salbach, has received a prestigious CIHR-funded EPIC-AT Fellowship from AGE-WELL.
This one-year training and mentorship program will enable Barbosa dos Santos to build on the research he has done on improving equity, diversity, inclusion and accessibility in a virtual exercise program for adults with mobility limitations.
Barbosa dos Santos’s first study was a scoping review to understand how other virtual exercise programs incorporated equity, diversity, inclusion and accessibility into their programs. “We found most programs didn’t provide training to research staff involved in delivering the programs on how to promote an inclusive and welcoming virtual environment,” he says.
This led to a second study – the development of an equity, diversity, inclusion, and accessibility module that all program providers completed, including the exercise facilitators and the health care professional monitoring the program.
As part of the fellowship, Barbosa dos Santos will be building on this research to understand the experiences of program participants. “In addition to conducting interviews, we recorded some exercise classes, and I’ll be watching them to understand the characteristics that promote or limit accessibility and inclusivity”.
“Because of this CIHR funding through the EPIC-AT fellowship and the mentorship that comes with it, I hope to bring new perspectives to my final thesis research,” he adds.
EPIC-AT—powered by AGE-WELL and hosted at the University of Toronto—empowers the next generation of researchers to lead the development and implementation of digital health solutions for older adults living with complex health needs. Barbosa dos Santos is one of twenty-eight recipients from across Canada to receive the award.
