The Environment, Community Health Observatory (ECHO) Network is a five-year research program (2017-2022) bringing together over 130 researchers, trainees, knowledge exchange partners, and community members. ECHO Network members have developed and refined a suite of integrative tools and processes aimed at taking notice of, analyzing, and responding to the health impacts of resource extraction, with specific emphasis on rural, remote and Indigenous communities. Acknowledging the existing research to action gap, as well as the applicability of many of our tools to addressing the climate crisis (an identified area of focus in health authorities), we are interested in hosting a reciprocal learning and sharing event between health researchers (ECHO Network), research users (health authority personnel), and trainees. We aim to: 1) Foster direct and reciprocal knowledge exchange pathways between researchers and health authorities to share and extend the reach of climate change-related tools; 2) Adapt research outputs to increase applicability of tools for health authorities; and 3) Promote intersectoral knowledge exchange training and capacity building among trainees, researchers, and health authority personnel.
Team members: Margot Parkes (UNBC); Angel Kennedy (SFU); Tim Takaro (SFU); Dawn Hoogeveen (SFU and First Nations Health Authority); Jordan Brubacher (SFU); Dionne Sanderson (First Nations Health Authority); Cody Thomas (First Nations Health Authority); Maery Kaplan-Hallam (First Nations Health Authority); Maeve Leduc (SFU); Sandra Harris (UNBC); Sue Pollock (Interior Health); Sandra Allison (Island Health); Christiana Onabola (UNBC); Katie Bauder (First Nations Health Authority); Holly Clermont (First Nations Health Authority); Diana Kutzner (First Nations Health Authority); Vishal Jain (Fraser Health); Krisztina Vasarhelyi (Vancouver Coastal Health); Raina Fumerton (Northern Health); Lars Hallstrom (University of Lethbridge); Lindsay Galway (Lakehead University); Celine Surette (Universite de Moncton).
This Health System Impact Fellowship is co-funded by CIHR, Michael Smith Health Research BC, and the First Nations Health Authority (health system partner), to help build BC’s health policy research capacity for the integration of policy research into decision-making.
Healing Indicators is a research project that aims to improve health assessment policy. It addresses the need to create tools that centre communities and Indigenous knowledge in the assessment of the health impacts of resource development. The project is grounded in community-based Indigenous methods, with the purpose of developing land-based wellness indicators. The work draws on self-determination, culture, kinship, community, and land to inform and define health and wellness in a First Nations context. As a research program, Healing Indicators is committed to engaging land-based healing and health justice and features a decolonial ‘two-eyed seeing’ approach, with one eye informed by Indigenous ways of knowing, and the other western science. Progressing land-based indicator research is important within the context of the First Nations Health Authority’s “Public Health and Wellness Agenda.” Land-based health indicator development requires emergent community-based methods and design that is inclusive of leadership from Indigenous peoples. The impact of this collaboration is the promotion of critical Indigenous health research, with opportunities to expand on policy gaps in relation to land-based wellness and Indigenous health assessment. Asset-based work, such as this, is relevant within the context of provincially acknowledged widespread racism within the health care system in British Columbia. This work is also significant to the provincial commitment to implement the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (DRIPA 2019). Healing Indicators is a collaborative research project designed to promote community-led health through land-based indicator development to inform self-determination and wellness in collaboration with the First Nations Health Authority.
Source: CIHR Funding Decisions Database
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Co-lead:
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Team members:
- Alexa Norton
FNHA
- Namaste Marsden
FNHA
- Kate Jongbloed
FNHA
- Riley Bizzotto
FNHA
- Jennifer Murray
FNHA
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In 2019, the FNHA partnered with the International Journal of Indigenous Health to release a special Guest Edition titled "Health Systems Innovation: Privileging Indigenous Knowledge, Ensuring Respectful Care, and Ending Racism towards First Nations in Service Delivery.” This proposal describes a series of knowledge translation (KT) activities that will bring wider awareness to the edition and will result in a timely and relevant KT tool. Through a Virtual Launch of the FNHA Guest Edition, we will showcase the range of submissions by Indigenous researchers and allied collaborators and engage in dialogue about how to best translate this information so that it is relevant and useful for Indigenous people and communities. Armed with insight about how to best translate and disseminate the FNHA Guest Edition, we will collaborate with Indigenous creatives (for example artists, filmmakers or digital storytellers) to develop and disseminate a KT tool for building capacity in community. By engaging in community-defined KT, we help to ensure that the findings and knowledge assembled within the Guest Edition are appropriately translated and will be of value to Indigenous people and communities.
