General Health

General health is the part of clinical research that is not built around a single diagnosis: prevention, vaccines, healthy ageing, weight and smoking, and studies that need volunteers who are well. It also covers the areas of health that are organised by who you are rather than by one organ, such as children’s health or women’s health. This page is a signpost, so you can get to the right area quickly.

Conditions in this area

• Healthy subjects: studies that enrol people who are not being treated for the condition under study, usually to measure how the body handles an investigational medicine or vaccine.
• Women’s health: menopause and hot flashes, periods and premenstrual symptoms, endometriosis, contraception, bladder health and breast cancer.
• Men’s health: erectile dysfunction, bladder and prostate symptoms, and the heart and metabolic conditions men are often diagnosed with later than women.
• Children’s health: ear infections, asthma, eczema, childhood immunisation and ADHD, written for a parent or guardian.
• Infectious diseases: colds and influenza, COVID-19, shingles, Lyme disease and the vaccine-preventable infections.
• Smoking cessation: nicotine dependence and the quitting support available across Canada, for the roughly 3.5 million people here who still smoke.
• Weight conditions: overweight and obesity as long-term medical conditions, and the care and research around them.

What these conditions have in common

What links this group is not biology. It is the way health care and health research are organised. Some of these pages exist because a condition affects a whole population rather than one organ, such as children or women. Others exist because the question is about staying well rather than treating a diagnosis: whether a vaccine produces a good immune response, whether a screening test finds disease earlier, whether a program helps someone quit smoking.

There is a practical thread too. Nearly everything here starts in primary care and turns on the same handful of measurements: blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol, weight, and what you smoke or drink. About 44 per cent of adults aged 20 and older in Canada live with at least one of ten common chronic conditions, so most people reading this are somewhere between healthy and unwell.

Treatment and management in Canada

Clinical research for General Health is enrolling. See the current studies ↓

General health care in Canada runs mostly through primary care and public health rather than through specialists. In practice that means:

• Periodic checks of blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol, and follow-up when a result is outside the usual range
• Routine immunisation across the lifespan, following the schedule in your province or territory
• Provincial and territorial cancer screening programs, which invite people by age and risk rather than by symptoms
• Support for quitting smoking, for weight and activity, and for sleep, including programs funded in every province and territory
• Referral into the right specialty area once a specific condition is identified

What is worth doing, and when, depends on your age and history. Those are decisions for you and your own clinician, and this page is not a recommendation about any of them.

When to talk to a doctor

• Chest pain or pressure, sudden weakness or numbness on one side, trouble speaking, or a sudden severe headache needs emergency care. Call 911.
• Trouble breathing, or a fever with confusion or unusual drowsiness, needs same-day assessment.
• Unintended weight loss, a new lump, bleeding that has no obvious explanation, or a cough lasting more than a few weeks should be assessed by a health care provider.
• A blood pressure, blood sugar or cholesterol result outside the usual range should be followed up, even if you feel well.
• If you have no regular family doctor or nurse practitioner, a provincial health line, walk-in clinic or community health centre can help you start.

Why research in this area matters

Understanding what keeps people well needs the same quality of evidence as treating disease, and it is harder to produce. Prevention studies have to follow people for years. Vaccine studies measure an immune response and record side effects across large groups. Healthy-volunteer studies tell researchers how a new medicine behaves before anyone with the condition receives it. Programs for smoking, weight and sleep are tested in trials too, because good intentions are not evidence.

The ground rules are the same everywhere in Canada. Participation is voluntary. You give informed consent before anything begins, after the study has been explained in plain language. You can withdraw at any time, without giving a reason, and without affecting the care you get from your own doctor. No one can tell you in advance whether a study will help you personally. For more on how this works, see why join a study.

Learn more from Canadian sources

• Public Health Agency of Canada: chronic diseases
• Canadian Immunization Guide
• Health Canada: Canada’s search portal for clinical trials
• Statistics Canada: health statistics