Participating Sites and Research Team

Research Team Leads
Dr. Brett Burstein
Dr. Karen Choong
Dr. Karina Top
Dr. Soren Gantt

What Did We Want to Know?

The short and long-term outcomes of the COVID-19 infection and vaccinations in children. 

How Did We Do It?

We asked families to join the study when they came to the emergency department or hospital with a COVID-19 infection. Information was then collected from their medical chart, and families filled out questionnaires about their health, quality of life, and mental health 4-5 times over one year.  

 An optional biobanking sub-study was also part of this project. In this study, blood samples were collected from patients with confirmed MIS-C, myocarditis, and pericarditis following COVID-19 vaccination or infection, as well as from controls. These samples can be used by future researchers in national and international research into the causes and risk factors of adverse events following vaccination and MIS-C.  

When Will I Be Needed?

What Specific Data Are We Collecting?

How Is the Study Going?

Follow up for the COVID-19 Prospective Cohort Study ended in May 2025. Since then, we have been working to clean and close the database. Data from this project will support a variety of in-progress projects. As the study came to an end, we also reflected on lessons learned from the past few years. Feedback from parents/caregivers and research teams provided valuable insights into factors that affect recruitment, retention, and participant experience in pediatric research. Some key lessons include:  

1. Maintaining engagement over multiple follow-up time points was challenging for research teams. Completion rates declined at later follow-ups, especially at the final study visit. 

   • We can improve this by offering flexible ways to contact participants and introducing self-scheduling tools to make participation more convenient.

2. Caregivers were more likely to ask about the purpose of the study during later follow-ups. This suggests the reasons for participating may not have been consistently reinforced throughout the study. 

   • We can improve by reminding participants about the study’s purpose and expectations, and by developing recruitment materials that clearly explain how the study contributes to child health research.

3. Recruitment for the biobanking sub-study was challenging. Scheduling conflicts limited opportunities to collect biological samples.  

   • We can improve by exploring minimally invasive collection methods (e.g., saliva, finger-prick samples) and considering the use of left-over clinical samples when appropriate

4. Language barriers were identified at several sites. This highlighted the need for more accessible study materials.  

   • We can improve by translating material and offering interpretation support where possible.

Figure Description: This graph shows the current number of participants in the COVID Cohort Study. The horizontal line shows how many participants are enrolled from each recruiting hospital in this study and the vertical line shows the recruiting hospital.

 Who Can Participate?

About 6,400 children and their families will take part in this study across Canada. POPCORN will invite children less than 18 years of age who came to the hospital recently and are being tested either for a COVID-19 infection or a rare complication sometimes associated with COVID-19 infection or a rare complication, such as MIS-C.

Biosample Sub-Study

In this study, blood samples will be collected from patients with confirmed MIS-C, myocarditis, and pericarditis following COVID-19 vaccination or infection, as well as from controls. These samples will be used in national and international research into the causes and risk factors of adverse events following vaccination and MIS-C.

When Will My Blood Be Taken?

Additional Sub-Studies

POPCORN researchers are working together to look at the data from the COVID-19 Study. They will check the data to make sure it is correct and makes sense. This is called data cleaning. After the data is cleaned, the team can study it and write about what they find.

For details on in-progress projects using the COVID Prospective Cohort data, see below: 

COVID Cohort Descriptive Analysis (Shaun Morris)

The goal of this project is to describe the characteristics of both SARS-CoV-2 positive and negative participants when they joined the study. This includes backgrounds such as age and ethnicity, pre-existing health conditions, symptoms during the hospital visit, and illness severity. We will also compare these characteristics between children with and without SARS-CoV-2 infection. 

PICU Ventilation Project (Guillaume Emeriaud)

There is sparse information about how children receive breathing support in pediatric intensive care units (PICUs) across Canada. Breathing supports are used to help children who are having trouble breathing. We will look at the types of breathing support used, how long children needed the support, and how well the support worked in children from the COVID-19 Prospective Cohort Study. Comparisons between children admitted to the PICU with and without SARS-CoV-2 infection will also be studied. 

Long-Term Outcomes Descriptive Analysis (Karen Choong) 

This project aims to examine the long-term health consequences of SARS-CoV-2 infection in children and families that were enrolled in the COVID-19 Prospective Cohort. This includes clinical symptoms, time to symptom resolution, symptom occurrence/recurrence after vaccination, reinfection, physical, cognitive, emotional, and social functioning and health related quality of life (measured by PedsQL Core scale), family impact and functioning (measured by PedsQL Family impact module), and mental health (measured by Revised Child Anxiety and Depression Scale-25 (RCADS25).  

Association between hospital length of stay and demographic characteristics of children seen in hospital for bronchiolitis, asthma, and pneumonia (Olivier Drouin) 

Secondary analysis will look to assess the association between key demographic characteristics and length of stay of children from the COVID-19 Prospective Cohort who were seen in the pediatric general inpatient and intensive care units. Specifically, we aim to assess disparities in hospital length of stay across 1) racial or ethnic family background, 2) household income, and 3) parental education. 

Secondary analysis of early independent predictors of severe COVID-19 in infants (Costanza Di Chara) 

Based on children who presented to POPCORN recruiting hospitals with SARS-CoV-2 infection, we aim to identify early predictors of severe SARS-CoV-2 infection in infants (<1 year of age), using data collected at hospital presentation. This will help to possibly identify a clinical risk profile for infants who may be at a higher risk of severe outcomes of SARS-CoV-2 infection.