PIRN is an emerging hospital-based national network focused on generating scientific knowledge to improve the outcomes of hospitalized children and youth in general pediatric inpatient units (GPIU). Founded in 2019, PIRN includes all academic children’s hospitals across Canada and nine large Ontario community hospitals, and is playing a critical role in advancing the field of pediatric hospital medicine. Our established national PIRN team of researchers, clinicians, parents, quality improvement leaders, and stakeholders, positions us well to conduct high-quality multi-centre randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in real-world settings, inform practice guidelines, disseminate findings, and change practice and policy. PIRN holds key partnerships, including with the Maternal Infant Child and Youth Research Network (MICYRN)’s ACT CTU, SPOR Support Units, hospital Patient and Family Advisory councils, and with other networks such as Pediatric Emergency Research Canada (PERC).
Since PIRN’s inception, pediatric hospitalist scientists and investigators have successfully been awarded grants as principal applicants, but the network has not received any dedicated funding for its infrastructure or development. PIRN investigators and sites have been actively involved in generating evidence in multiple clinical areas. For example, PIRN is the lead of the Inpatient Medicine pillar for POPCORN (Paediatric Outcome ImProvement through Collaboration Of Research Networks), a pan-Canadian CIHR-funded observational research platform using COVID-19 as a proof of concept for answering important questions. Currently, there are >15 active PIRN studies taking place at multiple sites in Canada, and collaborations have been formed with international pediatric inpatient networks including PRIS (US), CIRCAN (Australia/New Zealand) and GAPRUKI (UK). PIRN investigators are highly productive academically, with >15 network publications to-date. Moreover, PIRN is heavily involved in the research mentorship and education of new clinicians and researchers to build the next generation of child health clinician researchers in pediatric hospital care.
