Concordia’s State-of-the-Art Health Centre to Open in September
Construction of Concordia’s $35 million health and wellness facility is right on schedule, according to the facility’s organizers.
“I can guarantee that the clinic will be opening the first week of September,” said Dr. Geoff Dover, assistant professor in the department of exercise science.
The PERFORM Centre—an acronym for prevention, evaluation, rehabilitation and formation—is a first of its kind facility in Canada. Integrating health research, education, and community engagement, organizers say that PERFORM will provide exciting new ways to promote health in the community.
Concordia students and faculty are set to gain a lot from the facility, according to the administration. The Faculty of Sciences will see more students accepted, a new behavioral medicine centre, a new neuromuscular fatigue lab, a new PhD program, more faculty being hired and more internship opportunities.
“We are providing an internship for every one of the exercise science students,” said Dover. Students will intern in either the athletic therapy or community programs offered to the public, he explained.
Those in the general community will benefit as well, as a strong focus of the centre will be on an athletic therapy clinic.
“If I was playing basketball and hurt myself, I could go [to the clinic],” said Dover. The cost for a visit with a student athletic therapist will be $25—a nominal fee compared to what one would pay in a regular clinic, Dover explained.
Dover said that all student athletic therapists will be under the guidance of a registered athletic therapist and that, “in the unlikely event that something [bad] happens, they can intervene in a moment’s notice.”
There will also be a plethora of rehabilitation programs for those with cancer, diabetes and multiple sclerosis, among other afflictions. For the athlete and non-athlete alike, the centre will also be offering a weight management program, medical screening, a childhood lifestyle program and a nutrition program.
PERFORM’s chief financial officer projects that the facility will be out of the red in the first three to five years, and organizers are looking to team up with companies and organizations that are in similar fields of research—such as the Jewish General Hospital and St. Mary’s Hospital, as well as bio-tech and pharmaceutical corporations.
