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Newsletter

IN THIS ISSUE

IPAC IS ON FACEBOOK: PLEASE JOIN OUR GROUP!

We hope that all IPAC members (students, residents and physicians) will join and participate! We are using Facebook as a tool to connect members across the country, mentors and mentees, colleagues and friends. Through our Facebook group, we can share pictures, contact information, event information, job opportunities, anything that might interest the group -- and positive energy!

Please encourage an Indigenous colleague to register as an IPAC member and to join IPAC’s Facebook page today!

• Meet our new Board

• Healing our Spirit Worldwide

• Health Awards 2018/19

• IPAC AGM/NMF 2018

• IPAC Out & About

• Upcoming Events

Boozhoo! A big hello from where I live, work and play on unceded Coast Salish territory! On behalf of the IPAC Executive, I wish all IPAC members a Happy New Year! It’s been about a year since

I moved with my family from Toronto to Vancouver. It’s starting to feel more like home. Certainly we have enjoyed the proximity and easy access to great hiking and many opportunities to get outside on weekends – this is a major way that I unwind and take care of my own wellness. (Continued on page 2.)

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE

WINTER 2019

INDIGENOUS PHYSICIANSASSOCIATION OF CANADA

PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE (CONT.)

I hope you will enjoy reading through this newsletter, learning more about our members – our activities, our chal-lenges, and our achievements. There is a great deal of good, exciting news to share with you. IPAC held its 2018 annual conference and AGM at McMaster University and Six Nations of the Grand River Territory. Although our gathering was small in numbers, our focus on physician wellness was worthwhile as many of the presenta-tions were heartfelt and impactful. Check out some of the photos inside! It reminds us all that we will be limit-ed in helping our communities be healthy if we are not making our own health and wellbeing a priority. This issue of our newsletter will introduce you to our new IPAC Board members: we warmly welcome Dr. Kona Williams (Sec-retary), Dr. Melinda Fowler (Physician Director), Dr. Amanda Sauvé (Resident Director), and Ms. Alanna Martin-eau (Student Director). The IPAC Executive comprises me, Dr. Evan Adams (Vice-President), Dr. Samantha Boshart (Treasurer), and Kona. Please don’t hesitate to contact us with suggestions or to let us know how we’re doing!

To my recollection, IPAC has not held a recent conference farther east than Montreal (2017) and so we have made the decision, arrived at by consensus at the 2018 conference / AGM, to show support for our MD students and physi-cians in our Atlantic region by holding our next annual conference / AGM (August 2019) in St. John’s, Newfoundland! Given that many of us will be travelling long distances to get there, we are thinking of spreading our IPAC activities out over an extra day to be able to spend more time together. We also have been spending half a day / evening in an Indigenous community as part of our yearly gatherings but because of the vast distances in Newfoundland, one idea is that we host a social event / dinner at the St. John’s Native Friendship Centre. We’ll be sending out a “Save the Date” soon! If you’re interested in volunteering for our planning committee, please reach out to me at [email protected].

Another important announcement involves the Pacific Region Indigenous Doctors Congress (PRIDoC). As you may know, PRIDoC is a biennial gathering of Indigenous medical students, residents, physicians, associates, and family mem-bers. The six Indigenous medical associations that are part of the PRIDoC Council come from Hawaii, Mainland US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Taiwan. I had the pleasure of attending the 9th PRIDoC in July 2018 in Hilo on the beautiful Big Island of Hawaii. I’m happy and proud to announce that Canada has been accepted to host the 10th PRI-DoC in 2020 in Vancouver, BC! We will soon be striking a steering committee and there will be a need for volunteers on the various subcommittees (academic program, social, etc.) so if you are interested in participating, please let us know.

The IPAC Board and Executive has been moving the association forward in several ways. One is further expand-ing our website – to have more resources, to be more informative, and to establish a members-only portal where you can easily renew your annual membership and register for the annual conference. We are also thinking about expanding our fundraising initiatives, and as a non-profit organization with charitable tax status, we have add-ed a “donate” button to our homepage to make it easier and more convenient for prospective donors. Plans are also under way to open an online store where you will be able to buy t-shirts, tote bags, and eventually hood-ies and other merchandise branded with our IPAC logo! We need to increase the traffic to our website and will be exploring various possibilities as a Board. If you have any additional suggestions, please send them our way!

We are excited to announce that we have obtained funds for support staff to help us with all of this work: as a result of our partnership with The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada (RCPSC) over the past years, the College has agreed to provide us with up to five years of funding that we will manage completely independently and use to hire two part-time coordinators. One will be based in Ottawa and will be our “face” there at meetings in addition to coordinating fund-raising activities; the other will be working with us here in Vancouver and will provide support in organizing PRIDoC 2020.

We are in the process of seeking and evaluating applicants, so if you know of someone based in either Otta-wa or Vancouver who is looking for part-time work (two days/week) and may be a good fit with IPAC, please ask them to be in touch with us.

Lastly, several of our IPAC members have recently been significantly hon-oured for their career achievements. Huge congratulations on behalf of IPAC go out to Dr. Thomas Dignan (Order of Canada), Dr. Marlyn Cook (2019 Ind-spire Award Laureate in Health), and Dr. Marcia Anderson (Women’s Execu-tive Network’s Top 100 Most Powerful Women in Canada). You can read more about their inspiring accomplishments inside. Each of these physicians has worked in Indigenous health, breaking through various barriers, including sys-temic racism in the healthcare system.

Let’s let their work be motivating for us all – let’s lean in and be coura-geous this New Year as we go about our work in medicine, aiming above all to improve the health and wellness of Canada’s Indigenous Peoples, in-cluding, of course, ourselves. All the best to you and your families in 2019!

In Spirit, Chi-Miigwetch,

NelFollow me on Twitter @cwiemanOr email me at [email protected]

BC Gathering 2019On Friday, March 8 (evening); Sat-urday, March 9 & Sunday March 10, 2019, at UBC First Nations Long-house, IPAC will host an Indige-nous MD students’, residents’ and physicians’ gathering. This will be an opportunity for those of us liv-ing and working in BC to spend time together, network and sup-port each other as we discuss our wellness as Indigenous physicians and other challenges to learn-ing, training and clinical practice.

AGM/NMF 2019

PRIDOC 2020

SAVE THE DATES: IPAC-HOSTED EVENTS

In the summer of 2020, in Vancou-ver, BC, IPAC will host PRIDoC 2020, the 10th Annual Pacific Region In-digenous Doctors’ Congress. PRI-DoC provides a forum for Indige-nous doctors and students from across the Pacific to gather and discuss issues pertaining to the physical, mental, spiritual, social and cultural well-being of Indig-enous populations, including us. Call for Abstracts expected in 2019.

In August 2019, in St. John, New-foundland, IPAC will hold our next Annual General Meeting / National Mentorship Forum. We look forward to seeing you there! Volunteers for the planning committee can email Nel Wieman at [email protected].

3Indigenous Physicians Association of Canada

Dr. Kona Williams, IPAC’s new Secretary, is a forensic patholo-gist and coroner with the Ontario Forensic Pathology Service in Toronto. Dr. Williams completed her Bachelor of Science in Microbiology/Immunology and Biochemistry/Molecular Genet-ics (First Class Combined Honours), then her MD, at Dalhousie University, followed by a five-year residency in Anatomical Pa-thology at the University of Ottawa. In 2015, she completed a fellowship in Forensic Pathology at the University of Toronto. Dr. Williams is Cree (Peguis First Nation) and Mohawk (Kahnawake), and currently the only First Nations Forensic Pathologist in Can-ada. She is also the First Nations Liaison for the Ontario Forensic Pathology Service, and an appointed lecturer at the University of Toronto. She is soon to be relocating to Sudbury, Ontario to continue her work as a forensic pathologist. In her spare time, Dr. Williams practises Karate; she holds a second-degree black belt.

Dr. Fowler-Woods, IPAC’s new Physician-Director, works at the Uni-versity of Manitoba as Director of Ongomiizwin Education and as a Physician Mentor. She also holds appointments with the U of M’s Department of Community Health Sciences and the Department of Family Medicine and is active in clinical teaching at her clinics in the urban and on-reserve settings. Dr. Fowler-Woods, who is Mé-tis / Mi’kmaq, completed her MD and Family Medicine residency at McMaster University in 2010 and 2012, when she received the 2012 CFPC Resident Leadership award. She then worked as a physician at the Urban Aboriginal Health Centre, De Dwa Da Dehs Nyes in Hamil-ton. She was also an Assistant Clinical Professor with the Department of Family Medicine and the Aboriginal Mentor & Faculty Advisor with the Aboriginal Students Health Sciences office, McMaster University until moving to Winnipeg in 2014. Dr. Fowler also enjoys surgical assisting and has hospital privileges across Winnipeg to allow her to help in the OR. Dr. Fowler helped organize and host a three-day “Medical School Entrance Interview” workshop for Indigenous appli-cants at the University of Manitoba; this was a program she brought with her from McMaster University. With the support of the On-gomiizwin Institute of Health & Healing, Dr. Fowler plans to host this event annually to support Indigenous applicants and help increase the number of Indigenous medical student learners across Cana-da. She just completed her third year of traditional medicines with Kathy Bird at Matootoo Lake. Her personal interests include physi-cal fitness and healthy lifestyles, yoga, music, travel, tattoos, and her family life with her wife Amanda and daughters Jaeda and Saege.

INTRODUCING OUR NEW BOARD MEMBERS

4 Indigenous Physicians Association of Canada

Amanda Sauvé, IPAC’s new Resident-Director, is in her first year of Family Medicine Residency at the University of Toronto, training out of the Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre in Barrie, Ontario, where she was raised. On her father’s side, Amanda is a member of the Voyageur Métis Community, which regroups French Métis (Muskrat) families originating from the southern Great lakes/Midwest region; her mother is of mixed Irish, Scottish, English and African Ameri-can heritage. Amanda completed both undergraduate and medical training at Western University, obtaining her Bachelor of Medical Sciences in Physiology in 2013, and her MD in 2018. Amanda is pas-sionate about Indigenous health education. She was the 2016/17 National Officer of Indigenous Health for the Canadian Federation of Medical Students, where she engaged in research and advocacy work in Indigenous medical education, Indigenous mental wellness, and experiences of racism by Indigenous medical students. Aman-da is interested in the social experiences on health; she has spent time learning from various Indigenous community members, Elders and leaders in communities across Ontario, and is developing an ex-periential learning simulation to educate healthcare professionals about the social determinants of Indigenous health. She envisions herself practising comprehensive family medicine with a special in-terest on complex chronic disease, mental health and addictions. In her spare time, Amanda enjoys yoga, fitness, electronic music, and spending time with friends and family outdoors at Orr Lake.

Alanna Martineau, IPAC’s new Student-Director, is in her first year of medical school at the University of Calgary. A member of Frog Lake First Nation, she has nêhiyaw (Plains Cree) and Dene Suline roots from her father and Métis roots from her mother. Alanna completed a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology at the University of Lethbridge; during that time she worked as a Community Youth Worker with children and adolescents from Kainai First Nation. She then completed a Master of Science in Industrial / Organization-al Psychology at San Diego State University. Upon graduating, she worked for Accenture, a consulting firm, then worked in California for a few years before returning to Calgary. Alanna has extensive experience in Organization Effectiveness including process, team-work, leadership and employee development and large-scale Or-ganization Change Management. After a long stint working in the corporate world, her passion for mental health, helping others, and working with Indigenous communities led her to medical school.


IPAC OUT & ABOUT

IPAC’S AGM/NMF 2018 AT MCMASTER UNIVERSITY

This year’s AGM and annual conference was held from August 24th to August 26th at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. The theme was “Physician Wellness,, and we all had lots to share about

how we manage or work on our individual health and wellness. I hope everyone took away some ideas that might prove helpful!

After a traditional opening with speakers, we mingled at a Welcome Reception with appetizers and mocktails, then attended poster presentation sessions before going off for dinner on our own. The next morning we heard keynote presentations and other speakers, took part in confidential breakout sessions, then grabbed our pre-pared box lunches to forge through our AGM (including elections for Board members) until mid-afternoon. Later that evening, we were at Six Nations of the Grand River Territory, where we shopped at Iroqrafts – a long-standing IPAC tradition -- then were treated to an amazing dinner and social at one of Six Nations’ Longhous-es. Given that the conference theme was “Physician Wellness,” we made sure to allot free time for ourselves between the sessions and presentations. It was a great time, and I hope to see even more of you at the next AGM, which will be in August again, this time in St. John’s, Newfoundland. Please consider volunteering to be on the planning committee!


IPAC AGM/NMF 2018 AT MCMASTER UNIVERSITY (CONT.)

“IPAC really means: ‘We laugh, we learn from one another, we support one another,’ and ‘We share meals and social times together!’ It was so awesome to catch up!”


PRIDOC 2018 IN HILO, HAWAII: PRIDOC IN PICTURES

Representing Indigenous physicians from Canada! Dr. Rose Lenser with her son, Dr. Marcia Anderson, Dr. Nel Wieman, Dr. Evan Adams. Taken just after the Ava Cere-mony, which is an important custom / ritual performed at important occasions within the Samoan community.

Participating in a ceremony at Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. Measured from its base on the ocean floor, it rises over 10,000 m (33,000 ft) -- significantly greater than the elevation of Mount Everest above sea level. Saturday evening, we travelled about 6000 ft up Mauna Kea, the tallest mountain in the world, for ceremony and activism.


IPAC AT PRIDOC 2018 (CONT.)Dr. Emmett Aluli and Kekuhi Keali’ikanaka’ole confer before the conference at the University of Hawaii. Beautiful, strong, connected leadership.

We were asked by our hosts to bring water from our homelands for ceremony. As you can see, Drs. Darlene Kit-ty and Evan Adams complied -- we had a laugh about the fact that only docs would bring water from their home-lands in sterile urine testing containers!

We presented our water (from both the Arctic and Pacific oceans) and our rocks, at the opening ceremony. The sing-ing, drumming, hula and teachings on Hawai’ian nomen-clature were all amazing! It was the largest-ever gathering of Indigenous physicians from the Pacific Rim.

We learned much from Indigenous leaders from Australia, New Zealand, Alaska, Hawaii, BC, and other places across the Pacific region. All of us shared our respective Indig-enous organizations’ experiences and plans for sustain-ability -- individually and as a collective of Indigenous physicians. There were various wellness workshops as well as a kahili-making workshop (a kahili is a traditional Royal Hawai’ian feather standard).


Romlie Mokak (below R) received the Kekuni-Paratene Advocacy Award: all six Indigenous Physician organizations’ Presidents poured wai (water) into Romlie’s hands (below L)

Sunday morning focused on the challenges of climate change for Indigenous Peoples. “It was such an honour to speak on a panel with Taisu Kao (Taiwan) and follow a panel with brilliant young Hawai’ian women researchers Rosie Alegado, Haunani Kane, and Kealoha Fox.” ~ Nel

See more photos on our website!


For bolstering Indigenous medical education and health care delivery in Northern Manitoba, Dr. Marcia Anderson was named one of Canada’s Most Powerful Women in 2018 by Women’s Executive Network (WXN). Dr. Anderson, a Cree-Saulteaux woman with roots in Norway House Cree Nation and Peguis First Nation, is the Executive Director of Indigenous Academic Affairs in the Ongomiizwin Indigenous Institute of Health and Healing at the University of Manitoba. Her research interests in Indigenous health include urban Indigenous youth health, primary health care, and medical education. Throughout her career, Dr. Anderson has advocated for a more robust curriculum in Indigenous health and changes in the admissions process that would support the successful recruitment of increased numbers of First Nations, Métis and Inuit students. She was recognized for her efforts in 2011 with an Indspire Award.

Dr. Thomas Dignan of Thunder Bay, Ontario received the Order of Canada on December 27 for being recognized for his dedication to the health and well-being of Indigenous communities as a primary care physician over the course of 30+ years. Dr. Dignan graduated from medical school in 1981 as the first Indigenous student and at that time, the oldest student they had ever accepted (at 35). He said he was inspired to become a doctor at the young age of six when his mother took him to see an Indigenous doctor. “He was just so gentle, so polite, and he treated me like someone who knew what was going on. Since then, I wanted to be a doctor.” Dr. Dignan came to Thunder Bay as their first “emergency-educated physician” as he had completed an extra year during his internship to focus on emergency medicine. Afterwards, he worked as a physician in remote Indigenous communities in northern Ontario. As a licensed pilot and fly-in physician, Dr. Dignan continues to serve the northern and western regions of Ontario and divides his time working as a primary care physician for Anishinawbe Muskiki Native Health Access Centre in Thunder Bay and as a medical officer for the First Nations and Inuit Health Branch of Health Canada.

Dr. Marcia AndersonDr. Marlyn Cook

Dr. Cook will receive the 2019 Indspire Award in the Health category. One of the first In-digenous physicians in Can-ada, Dr. Cook grew up on the Misipawistick Cree Nation in northern Manitoban in the 1950s, and graduated from the University of Manitoba’s Facul-ty of Medicine in 1987. She has served as a family physician on reserve lands for 30 years.

“[This award] means somebody acknowledged that I do that work of traditional healing with the Western practice,” said Dr. Cook, who was the first First Na-tions woman to graduate from the University of Manitoba’s Faculty of Medicine in 1987. She has seen first-hand the racism many Indigenous people expe-rience in the healthcare system, and is determined to be an ad-vocate and make some changes.

Check out this CBC arti-cle on Dr. Cook and her ca-reer: https://www.cbc.ca/n e w s / c a n a d a / m a n i t o b a /marlyn-cook-1.4844093?plat-form=hootsuite.

Dr. Thomas Dignan

AWARDS IN HEALTH


Ms. Fontes, an Anishnaabe member of the Couchiching First Nation and a PhD student at the University of Manitoba, is the 2018/19 recipient of the Canadian Family Physicians of Canada’s Medical Student Award.

This award recognizes medical students who demonstrate a commitment to family medicine and who have engaged with family medicine extracurriculars as well as with the community at large.

“I am proud and honoured to be the recipient of an award that values humanism in medicine and celebrates those physicians that have demonstrated their engagement and commitment to their community,” said Amanda. “I am excited to continue learning from and working with my community in order to provide the best care I can.”

Amanda FontesDr. Melinda Fowler-Woods

Dr. Fowler-Woods received a CBC Manitoba’s Future 40 Un-der 40 Award (2018). These awards showcase “some of the brightest young minds and in-fluential change-makers under 40 working to make Manitoba better for future generations.”A Métis-Mi’kmaq woman who grew up on Canada’s East Coast, Dr. Fowler-Woods is the direc-tor of Ongomiizwin education at the University of Manitoba’s Indigenous Institute of Health and Healing. She received her bachelor of nursing and then her doctor of chiropractic de-grees, and finally her medical degree and family medicine residency when studying at McMaster University. She now holds multiple appointments on boards, such as the U of M’s department of community health sciences and the depart-ment of family medicine, and is active in clinical teaching at the Mount Carmel and Broken-head Ojibway Nation clinics. Dr. Fowler-Woods also enjoys surgical assisting and has hos-pital privileges across Win-nipeg to allow her to help in the operating room. Current-ly, she is in her fourth year of traditional medicine studies.

CFPC Awards Nominations / Applications / Grants 2019!

The College of Family Physicians of Canada’s (CFPC) Foundation for Advancing Family Medicine (formerly known as the CFPC’s research & education foundation) distributes approximately $500,000 annually in awards, grants, and scholarships to family physicians at all stages of their careers.

Find your next opportunity at https://fafm.cfpc.ca/ -- many grant applications are due February 1 – don’t miss out!

The awards program celebrates members’ achievements and outstanding work through funding for scholarships and grants, and by promoting their successes.

https://fafm.cfpc.ca/h-a/about-honours-and-awards/


RACISM IN HEALTH CARE By Lauren Vogel for CMAJ News

Early in Dr. Cornelia Wieman’s career as a psychiatrist, a patient refused to see her because she was Indigenous. “I tried to talk to them, to explain I was qualified, but the patient was adamant,” she says. Humiliated, Wieman called an outpatient clinic to send another doctor. “I didn’t feel like I had a choice, and even now, 20 years on, I don’t know if I would, either.”

Doctors who aren’t white often face racism at work, but there’s little recourse when they do. Medical regulators, professional organizations, schools and institutions don’t often have policies and protocols to guide or protect targeted doctors. “Institutions would rather just deal with it individually and quickly, trying to avoid any litigious situations,” says Wieman, president of the Indigenous Physicians Association of Canada. Sometimes, “your colleagues and the administrative structure are not really that supportive or culturally safe, either.”

This often leaves physicians alone in dealing with patient prejudice. In Ontario, doctors have the right to refuse to treat someone if they feel at risk of harm, but it’s unclear how this applies to racist abuse. Refusing to treat a patient may open a doctor to a regulatory complaint. Many physicians simply ignore abuse and keep working, but this also increases their risk of a complaint if something goes wrong. Even transferring patients to a colleague runs the risk of looking like you’re unable to cope, Wieman says. “There is still that machismo attitude in medicine, like, you have to buckle down and do the best job and it doesn’t matter whether this patient is abusive.” Over time, “it can really take a toll on people.”

There aren’t good statistics on the racial makeup of Canada’s physician workforce or their experiences of racism. Anecdotally, certain physicians receive more abuse than others, says Dr. Sohail Gandhi, president-elect of the Ontario Medical Association. Recent immigrants, those with accents and those working in larger cities “perhaps have more day-to-day issues with racist behavior.”

Physician organizations could do a better of job raising awareness about the additional challenges these doctors face, says Gandhi. “It’s hard to appreciate if you’re not living it.” Medical regulators could make the biggest difference by specifically addressing racism in anti-abuse policies, he adds. Physicians need specific guidance to know “it’s okay to say this has happened and there’s a way of dealing with it that won’t get me into trouble.”

American organizations are starting to address the problem, but Canada has lagged, says Dr. Kulvinder Gill, president of Concerned Ontario Doctors. One issue is that most medical leaders in Canada are white and may not realize the extent of the racism their non-white colleagues face. In the Greater Toronto Area, for example, only 16% of hospital senior management and 14% of hospital boards are not white, compared to 47% of the general population. As a result, organizations often treat incidents of racism that surface in the media as the exception rather than the rule, says Gill. “They put out a few sentences saying that it’s not the Canada they know; there’s similar wording almost every time, but it doesn’t go beyond that.” Click here for the rest of Lauren Vogel’s article: https://cmajnews.com/2018/08/29/doctors-on-their-own-when-dealing-with-racism-from-patients-cmaj-109-5633/

NOTICE re Sixties’ Scoop settlement: The deadline for “Scoopees” to have their claim forms submitted is August 2019 to qualify for compensation.

See https://www.sixtiesscoopsettlement.info/ .


HEALING OUR SPIRIT WORLDWIDE - 8TH GATHERING, 2018

The Eighth Gathering of Healing Our Spirit Worldwide was held at the International Convention Cen-tre, Sydney, Australia from November 26 to 29, 2018. As always, the gathering brought together In-digenous peoples from around the world to gather and celebrate the power of our knowledge and our wisdom, to share our stories with pride and purpose and to harness the spirit within and around us.

IPAC Vice President Dr. Evan Adams was there with FNHA CEO Joe Gallagher to present a workshop on “Es-tablishing First Nations Population Health and Wellness Indicators for the Next 10 Years” and to listen and learn from the other presenters and participants. Other inspirational and educational presentations included Dr Lynne Russell and Witeria (Witi) Ashby on “Kaupapa or kūpapa: Fighting back against institutional racism in the workplace,” and Dr Kahu McClintock, Professor Pat Dudgeon, Dr Alexandra King, Michele Connelly and Professor Malcolm King on “A Collaboration on Indigenous Health and Wellness Outcomes Measures.”

Evan and Joe, along with Janene Erickson, a manager in the CEO’s office, soaked in as much wisdom as they could to bring back to Canada and even found time to run in a local Ironman marathon (photo below).


The 23rd IUHPE World Conference on Health Promotion will be held from April 7 to 11, 2019 in Roorua, Aotearoa, New Zealand, where the International Union for Health Promotion and Education (IUHPE) is based. The aim of this global public health event is to provide an unparalleled opportunity to link and demonstrate the contribution of health promotion to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals and to acknowledge the way these goals contribute to improvements in health and well-being. Participants will share knowledge from our diverse cultural systems for the well-being of the planet and humanity, based on the common understanding that sustainable development for all is the means by which to ensure health justice globally and for future generations. “Waiora” is an indigenous Māori concept that refers to the interconnectedness of our physical and spiritual worlds with our own environment. Proposals from around the world and in all official languages of the conference – English, French, Spanish and Māori – were received for IUHPE 2019. For full information, visit http://www.iuhpe2019.com/en-gb/aboutus.

MARCH 2019

UPCOMING EVENTS & DEADLINES

FEBRUARY 2019

The 8th International Meeting on Indigenous Child Health will be held from March 22 to 24, 2019, in Calgary, Alberta . This is the only conference dedicated to the health and well-being of Indigenous children and youth in North America and around the world. From mental health to infectious diseases, early childhood to adolescence, the International Meeting on Indigenous Child Health is a forum for exploring a range of health-promoting programs and strategies. We focus on community-based solutions. For full information, visit https://www.cps.ca/en/imich.

CALL FOR ABSTRACTS: CFPC Family Medicine Forum 2019

ABSTRACT SUBMISSION DEADLINES:Call for sessions and workshops: February 9, 2019 Call for free-standing papers: April 5, 2019 Call for posters: April 5, 2019 For full information, visit https://fmf.cfpc.ca/abstracts/

APRIL 2019


APRIL 2019

COMING SOON:

In Ontario, there is a planning group working at creating an Indigenous stream within the Psy-chiatry Residency Training Program (5 years); this would allow for Indigenous & non-Indigenous psychiatry residents to receive more specialized training in working with our peoples and com-munities. The three schools involved are: the University of Toronto, McMaster University, and the Northern Ontario School of Medicine. This new Indigenous stream will ensure that psychiatry trainees get exposure to urban, rural & remote Indigenous communities.

NOVEMBER 2019

For full information, visit https://www.mededworld.org/Confer-ences/Conference-Items/Lead-ers-in-Indigenous-Medical-Educa-tion-2019-Confe.aspx


Watch the video for this event at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYh_H_GR_ck

Healing our Spirit World Wide 2022 - Vancouver, BC

For full information, visit https://mededconference.ca/


THE TRUTH & RECONCILIATION COMMISSIONHOW IPAC MEMBERS ARE SUPPORTING THE TRC’S CALLS TO ACTION

In this section, we feature brief and high-level updates on IPAC members’ work as it relates to the TRC’s calls to action on health care. (See past issues, which highlight the First Nations Health Authority’s TRC response, the University of Calgary’s TRC response, and McMaster University’s TRC response.)

The IPAC itself continues to advocate for cultural safety, including the residential school experience in Indigenous health curriculum, and will continue to do so.

We also strive to support Indigenous student admissions, support and community engagement. As the numbers of Indigenous physicians increase, and more non-Indigenous physicians and health professionals learn about this, we will see improved, culturally safe care and resources for Indigenous patients, families and communities.

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: Please share how your organization is responding to the TRC’s calls!


Are you interested in contributing to our Newsletter? Want to share a story?

Your perspective? Your photos? Some news? Talk about your work or your

community? Share a job opportunity? Promote an event? We want to hear

from you! Contact us at [email protected].

Detail, “Medicines from the Universe,” by Christi Belcourt. www.christibelcourt.com

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