Having a stroke and a heart transplant have not defined Jennifer Monaghan, but rather given her the experience and passion to become an active volunteer and advocate. A lawyer by training, she is engaged in many national, provincial and local initiatives. She is a member of the Executive Committee of StrokeCog Recovery Trials, the world’s first clinical trial platform dedicated exclusively to stroke recovery. With the Heart & Stroke Foundation she currently is a member of the BC Rehab and Reintegration Strategy, was a Co-Facilitator on “Living with Stroke” and a member of the Community Consultation and Review Panel for the Canadian Stroke Best Practice Recommendations. She received the inaugural Nieboer Lecturer Award from the Heart & Stroke Foundation, in collaboration with the Canadian Neurovascular Consortium and the Canadian Partnership for Stroke Recovery in 2021. She served on the Heart & Stroke Foundation’s Mission Council on Vascular Cognitive Impairment, the British Heart Foundation’s “Big Beat Challenge” research award in London, UK and numerous other volunteer endeavors.

She recently organized and ran two events in her health authority for PWLE in stroke called “Understanding Stroke Researcher in the Okanagan” that were very well received. In 2024 she undertook the Patient And Community Engagement Research program through UofC. She is the Patient Partner for StokeGoRed, Canada's first national research network dedicated to stroke in women. She was only 43 when, without any risk factors, her stroke and ultimate discovery of cardiomyopathy happened, so she feels particularly invested in supporting health care and research on the heart and brain. She is currently Co-Lead on the” Brain-Heart Failure Priority Setting Partnership" research which brings together her greatest health challenges.