About


“Harnessing the power of Canadian public health intelligence”

Revolutionizing how we share and access information about health promotion and chronic disease prevention initiatives.

CAPTURE is a freely accessible, web-based repository that Canadian public health practitioners and program managers can use to find and share practice-based evidence. Not just limited to published literature or best practices, CAPTURE provides a platform for collecting and disseminating the full breadth of activity across Canadian public health.

The CAPTURE Project is a strategic initiative funded by the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer.

For more information, click on our poster or read our information sheet.

Our vision

We have effective primary prevention of chronic disease in Canada because we learn from what we do.

Our mission

The CAPTURE Project will collect, share and support the use of “real-world” evidence on what works, for whom and in what context, to improve primary prevention of chronic disease.

Our values

User driven, continuous learning, servant leadership, interdependence and shared resource.

Dr. Diane Finegood

Executive Director

Diane FinegoodDr. Finegood brings creativity and vision to CAPTURE based on a fusion of her engineering training and her experience with the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). Initially known in the academic community for her unique use of mathematical modeling to understand the pathogenesis of both type 1 and type 2 diabetes, she is now applying a complex systems lens to find novel solutions to the obesity epidemic. This shift in focus to population level systems developed during her eight years of service (2000–2008) as the inaugural Scientific Director of the CIHR-Institute of Nutrition, Metabolism and Diabetes.

She has an ability to identify unique opportunities and turn them into innovative initiatives. At CIHR she launched Canada on the Move, a novel research platform that enabled learning from a combined sales and social marketing health promotion campaign. She also pushed the boundaries of research funding by leading the development of a novel funding program for population health interventions. Dr. Finegood’s experiences with cross-sector partnerships compelled her to initiate an ongoing dialogue about building trust in public-private partnerships emphasizing common interests in finding solutions to the obesity epidemic.

Dr. Finegood is also Professor in the Department of Biomedial Physiology and Kinesiology and Director of the Chronic Disease Systems Modeling Laboratory at Simon Fraser University.

She has received numerous awards including the 2006 Canada’s Top 100 Women Award in recognition of her trailblazing and trendsetting work and the 2008 Frederick G. Banting Award from the Canadian Diabetes Association for her leadership and significant contributions in the Canadian diabetes community.

She obtained her doctoral degree in physiology and biophysics from the University of Southern California and has bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Michigan and Northwestern University.

David Crouch

Director of Innovation

David Crouch is the Director of Innovation at The CAPTURE Project. David has an eclectic background in neurophysiology, immunology, systems science, software engineering, database design and project management: skills he gained from stints in university-based research, the federal government, consulting and the video game industry.

Prior to joining CAPTURE, he worked for the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)—Institute of Nutrition, Metabolism and Diabetes. At CIHR, David managed the operation of Canada on the Move: an innovative multi-sector research project that studied the effects of putting a million pedometers into cereal boxes. He was also a key contributor to the success of the CIHR-INMD Intervention Research funding program: a funding opportunity created to bridge the traditional divide between research and evaluation by providing incentives for university-based researchers to get involved in studying policy and program improvements.

As co-chair of the Portal Working Group, David was instrumental in redesigning the Public Health Agency of Canada’s Canadian Best-Practices Portal, which seeks to improve policy and program decision-making by providing access to the best available evidence on chronic disease prevention and health promotion. At CAPTURE, he has explored the importance of tacit knowledge as it relates to decision makers on the front lines.

Outside his professional life, David is full time chauffeur and part time soccer coach for his son and daughter. In the midst of these commitments, he manages to immerse himself in classic car restoration—a passion he has cultivated for over 25 years.

David has a Master of Science from Simon Fraser University and a Bachelor of Science from the University of Guelph.

Dr. Marla Steinberg

Director of Evaluation

Marla has an extensive career—spanning over 20 years—in the evaluation field. She has broad policy and program evaluation expertise and recent experience in developing organization-wide evaluation frameworks which will help guide the establishment of The CAPTURE Project’s evaluation plan.

Marla believes that CAPTURE can facilitate evaluation capacity building on an unprecedented scale—an exciting possibility closely tied to her longstanding interest in promoting evaluation.

She began her career as an independent evaluator working on policy and program evaluations in health and criminal justice issues. Since then, she has worked on the evaluation of policies and programs in a number of areas including health promotion, child sexual abuse, prostitution, sexual health, family support, and health research funding.

Prior to joining The CAPTURE Project, Marla worked for 10 years at the BC Regional Office of the Public Health Agency of Canada where she led the development and implementation of an evaluation framework for a federally funded early childhood development program. Since 2008 she has worked for the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research as Senior Director, Analysis and Evaluation managing the development of an evaluation framework for two evidence-use projects in large health service organizations.

Throughout her career she has worked in close partnership or collaboration with various stakeholders at the federal and provincial levels, and among non-governmental organizations. Marla has also been a member of several multi-disciplinary teams and working groups such as the province-wide Early Childhood Development evaluation steering committee in BC. She has also co-chaired a national evaluation team within the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Marla has a Ph.D. in social psychology from York University and an M.A. in applied social psychology from the University of Guelph.

Dayna Albert

Manager, Practitioner Engagement

Dayna Albert Dayna comes to CAPTURE from The Ontario Public Health Association where she was instrumental in developing the Towards Evidence-Informed Practice (TEIP) Program. Her work with TEIP is directly relevant to CAPTURE. She brings five years of experience in developing practical, skill-building tools for practitioners, in designing and delivering Master Trainer Workshops and addressing issues of organizational capacity-building.

Although Dayna will wear two hats – working half-time as Manager of Towards Evidence-Informed Practice and half-time for CAPTURE as Manager of Practitioner Engagement – her work for both organizations is fitting.

By working for CAPTURE and TEIP, which share similar goals, philosophies and strategies regarding the importance of real-world evidence and the value of continuous learning, Dayna hopes to bring her expertise and skills to support evaluation capacity-building and to strengthen evidence-informed decision-making in practice.

Dayna holds an MA in adult education and a BSc both from the University of Toronto. She is a member in good standing of the Canadian Evaluation Society and is working towards achieving credentialed evaluator status under the newly launched CES Professional Designations Program.

Kedou (Lance) Jian

Web Developer

Lance comes to CAPTURE with extensive experience in computer programming in Canada and China. His career in software and web development is driven by his passion for the latest developments in the IT industry.

Prior to joining CAPTURE, Lance worked as a software developer for SwedishPress and Axis Engineering. He was a key figure in designing their applications and maintaining their websites. Lance also interned at Sage Software Canada where he was a part of the SimplyAccounting software development team. Outside work, Lance enjoys playing the guitar, jogging and reading.

Lance completed his Bachelor Degree in Material Science from Central South University of China and obtained a diploma of technology from the British Columbia Institute of Technology. He was awarded the BCIT Computer Systems Award in Technical Programming in 2009.

John Chang

Web Developer

John’s enthusiasm for solving computational problems has motivated him to focus his career in information technology. His main areas of interest are in the design and development of operating systems and Web 2.0 applications.

He joins The CAPTURE Project as a web developer, actively working within the development team in defining and implementing the architecture and features of the CAPTURE Platform.

While finishing his undergraduate degree, John worked for industry leaders SAP and IBM. At SAP, he was responsible for benchmarking its business intelligence platform; ensuring the product’s performance and reliability. As a software developer at IBM, he was a key member in developing the front-end of its Master Data Management server where he ensured the product’s user interfaces conformed to government accessibility standards.

John obtained his Bachelor of Science degree in computer science at Simon Fraser University, specializing in software engineering.




Funded by: