2025 CAnD3 Keynote Address : The Hidden Epidemic: Chronic Pain in Social and Demographic Context
Register Here
We are pleased to announce the upcoming CAnD3 Keynote Address, the culminating event of our 2024-2025 Training Program. This hybrid event, hosted annually at the McGill Faculty Club, featuring Professor Anna Zajacova from the University of Western Ontario, will bring together Dragon's Den finalists, CAnD3 alumni, institutional partners, and current Fellows. It commemorates the achievements of our six consecutive cohorts (2020-2025) and introduces the incoming 2025/2026 Fellows.
This year, we are honoured to be having esteemed Professor Anna Zajacova from the University of Western Ontario as a keynote speaker. With her research focus on chronic pain, Prof. Zajacova will examine how chronic pain affects millions but remains poorly understood both in the public imagination and in population science. This talk will take a population perspective on how pain is defined, measured, and distributed—revealing striking social inequalities, surprising measurement challenges, and emerging insights from new experimental data. The discussion will also touch on policy implications, including the opioid crisis and health care responses.
Itinerary
Door opens at 10:00 AM.
10:30 - 11:50 | Keynote Lecture by Prof. Zajacova and Q&A
11:50 - 12:10 | Rapid fire introduction of posters
13:45 - 15:30 | Dragons' Den Finals
16:00 - 16:50 | Partners & Fellows Showcase
16:50 - 17:20 | Policy Brief Presentations & Q&A
17:20 - 17:45 | Announcement of Dragons' Den Winners & Closing Remarks
Location
This is a hybrid event. The online portion of the event will be held on Zoom, and the in-person portion will be held at the Faculty Club (3450 McTavish Street) at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. In-person capacity is limited. If you registered to attend in-person and can no longer join us, please notify us at cand3 [at] mcgill.ca.
About the Speaker
Anna Zajacova
Anna Zajacova is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Western Ontario. Her research examines chronic pain, focusing on its social determinants and consequences, and disparities among Canadian and U.S. adults. Since earning a PhD in Demography and Sociology from Princeton University, she has published over 90 studies in leading journals such as PAIN, The Journal of Pain, and Demography. Her work, funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, explores how pain fits into broader population health patterns.