A 20-year journey of health research: A ‘whole-person’ approach

Photo courtesy of Dr. Kelli Stajduhar

Dr. Kelli Stajduhar: A ‘whole-person’ approach to palliative care and peer review

“We were trying to save them without acknowledging the devastation to families and the people themselves.”

Dr. Kelli Stajduhar’s focus on human-centred and community-driven care began during her nursing career in Manitoba, where she was working in a highly acute unit in a large, inner city teaching hospital that handled all the solid organ transplants in the province. In this role, and in her subsequent work during the harrowing AIDS epidemic, Kelli saw many patients who weren’t having their pain managed or even acknowledged. 

In BC, only 15 to 30 per cent of people who could benefit from palliative care and support systems have access to these specialized services.

Since then, this six-time award recipient of MSFHR funding has focused on putting the “care” back into palliative care and policy for people with complex, terminal illnesses. In BC, only 15 to 30 percent of people who could benefit from palliative care and support systems have access to these specialized services. The traditional model of palliative care was born out of a cancer model and is focused on end-of-life services for terminal cancer patients, which may not be appropriate for all persons facing life-limiting chronic illnesses (citation). Applying an equity lens and a strong focus on community and vulnerable populations, Kelli’s research sets out to reform this model to provide and improve palliative care in multiple settings, including for long-term care clients and hard-to-reach, homeless populations.

“My work has always been rooted in a commonsensical way of coming together to treat people who are most vulnerable, in ways that are loving and respectful and that show them we care. What is the ‘care’ in health care if we don’t show people we care?” Kelli says.

Kelli credits MSFHR’s funding awards as the catalyst for launching her career and the careers of other researchers. She was among the first cohort to receive Research Trainee awards in 2001. In the years since, Kelli has volunteered her time serving in the roles of both reviewer and chair on MSFHR peer review panels. Her focus on people’s well-being extends to how she approaches application evaluations, as she takes care to acknowledge the many roles that women researchers, in particular, play in their own lives and in society.

“When I chair peer review panels for MSFHR, there will always be conversations about recognizing different circumstances,” she says. “The most powerful thing is when a funding agency recognizes that maybe I can’t have as much productivity as somebody who doesn’t have dual responsibilities, because I’m probably playing an even more important role in the care of my family and children. We’re academics, we’re researchers, and we’re also mothers taking on domestic responsibilities.”

In reflecting on the past 20 years, Kelli notes that as women have more career opportunities, she’s seeing a greater understanding that women have multiple roles to fill in their lives — and that organizations, including MSFHR, are placing greater value on equity and diversity in their funding programs. For Kelli, supporting underserved populations is a familiar road, and, much like her research, a cause she looks forward to continuing to champion.

“The most powerful thing is when a funding agency recognizes that maybe I can’t have as much productivity as somebody who doesn’t have dual responsibilities, because I’m probably playing an even more important role in the care of my family and children.”