By Odette Auger, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Windspeaker.com
The First Nation Health Authority in British Columbia has partnered with the national Health Standards Organization to develop a guide of behaviours and expectation of quality as the professional benchmark for cultural safety and humility in health care.
The result is a first-of-its-kind Cultural Safety and Humility Standard (CSHS) to be used as a tool to end Indigenous-specific racism in the B.C. health-care system.
This partnership began in 2018, said Dr. Nel Wieman, (Anishinaabe), the deputy chief medical officer at FNHA. She co-chaired the technical committee that created the new CSHS standard.
The work began two years before the In Plain Sight report, which documented widespread racism in B.C.’s health-care system toward Indigenous people.
“Indigenous-specific racism in B.C.’s health-care system is long-standing and pervasive and its ongoing presence continues to have harmful impacts on the overall health and well-being of B.C. First Nations people today,” reads a FNHA press release announcing the standard.
For this reason, First Nations health professionals, with input from community chiefs, led the development of the new standard.
“Most importantly, we included the voices of patients,” said Wieman.
Representatives from the Patient Voices Network were included on technical committee. The committee reviewed 1,100 statements from Indigenous people in B.C., health organizations and health professionals.
Elder Gerry Oleman (St’at’imc) co-chaired the technical committee which was made up mostly of Indigenous people. He explained the essence of the new cultural safety and humility standard.
“When we say justice, we mean justice and absolute fairness for all. Today I can say there is a standard. We set a high bar about dealing with cruelty and fairness. We’re talking about accountability.”
