Grant Development and Support

Heart & Stroke Foundation - Grants-in-Aid Application Support

The Heart & Stroke Foundation (HSF) provides excellent funding opportunities each year for cardiovascular researchers.

Specifically, the Grants-in-Aid (GIA) program provides operating funds to individual researchers with a broad mandate of supporting "important, pertinent, novel research in the areas of heart disease and/or stroke" and promoting "research discovery, exploration and innovation across all health research themes".

The HSF GIA Program provides funding for a maximum of $400,000 over 4 years. Projects across all four (CIHR) pillars of research (Biomedical, Clinical, Health Systems Services, and Social, Cultural, Environmental and Population Health) can apply.

Next Competition

The 2027 GIA competition has been launched!

The application is on August 27, 2026. The internal RAS deadline is August 20, 2026.

The University of Alberta tends to do reasonably well in the GIA competitions, but there are likely more researchers who could benefit from this opportunity. The Research Partner Network (RPNet) aims to support the cardiovascular research community to help increase the number of applications being submitted and odds of success.

Considering applying? Join our HSF GIA mailing list to receive updates on this competition and the related support (e.g., information sessions).

Pre-Plan

To help your submission, the Research Partner Network provides the following supports and support materials:

  1. Heart & Stroke Competition Report - December 2025 - this report provides an overview of past GIA competitions and includes a list of past successful UofA award recipients.
  2. Preliminary Application Document - outlines the application sections and requirements based on the previous year’s competition.
  3. The updated HSF GIA Guidelines (2027)
  4. The GIA program now uses the BioSketch CV format, which is similar to the Tri-agency CV. Detailed instructions are available, and a template can be found here.
  5. An information session and panel discussion was held in May with members of the GIA review committee. The recording can be accessed here (CCID required), as well as a short summary of the main points.
  6. If your project is a clinical study, Robin Love, research partner for clinical research (robin.love@ualberta.ca) can provide additional support. Similarly, if your project involves Indigenous health research, please note that Makayla LeSann, research partner supporting Indigenous researchers and researchers engaged in Indigenous research (mlesann@ualberta.ca), is available for consultation.
  7. Time permitting, additional application support can be provided upon request (e.g., non-expert review by research partner, editorial support); please contact Floor Spaans (floortje@ualberta.ca).

All cardiovascular researchers are encouraged to explore the Heart & Stroke GIA opportunity and to use these documents to assist with preparing their applications for the next competition.

The Research Partner Network support lead for Heart & Stroke is Floor Spaans. Please direct any questions you may have to Floor (floortje@ualberta.ca). If you are new to the program, we encourage you to get in touch to discuss your research project, questions or application process/details.