She hopes the master’s program will eventually train 30 Indigenous nurses to a higher level of expertise to work with their communities and within their own knowledge systems.
Adopting a holistic approach to health — one that incorporates the land and its medicines to aid with spiritual, mental and physical wellness — will be a major focus, she said.
Incorporating an Indigenous lens is needed in health care, she said. This includes “how we are connected to the land, the people, our culture and language.”
She said the schools are now working to strengthen relationships with Indigenous communities.
“We really need to create a place where communities see themselves in this,” said Bearskin, an associate professor of nursing at the University of Victoria.
Historically, she said, schools of nursing have not had good relationships with Indigenous communities. So it’s the communities, she said, that are helping design the project.
“It’s not a safe place to learn, so there’s a reluctance to come into nursing and there’s a fast exit of leaving nursing,” she said. “We can’t just keep recruiting nurses into nursing if we don’t change the system.”
According to the In Plain Sight report in 2020, 59 per cent of Indigenous health-care workers in B.C. said their colleagues had expressed discriminatory or hateful comments in front of them.
“Listening to all these stories around racism, I think about the fatigue that we hold as Indigenous nurses,” said Bearskin.
One of the report’s recommendations was a degree program for nursing.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission also called for an increase the number of Indigenous professionals working in the health-care field and providing cultural training for all health-care professionals.
While training Indigenous nurses is the priority, Bearskin said the new master’s program in development would welcome non-Indigenous health-care providers who want to build relationships with Indigenous communities.
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