Moving Knowledge into Action
Who Is Praxis?
We are a non-profit organization based in BC with a mission to lead collaboration across the global spinal cord injury community, and a goal to reduce the incidence and severity of paralysis after spinal cord injury (SCI), improve health care outcomes, reduce long-term costs, and improve the quality of life for those living with SCI.
Praxis takes a multi-disciplinary approach to our work by bringing together people with lived experience of SCI (PLEX) with researchers, clinicians, and innovators. We believe that lived experience should inform and direct our endeavours, in order to ensure that our outcomes are meaningful and have a positive impact for people with SCI and related disabilities.
Our PLEX team brings together people with lived experience whose role is to help the organization set priorities and ensure new discoveries make it into the SCI community.
Our Research + Care programs help support and enable SCI research globally by co-ordinating research, developing standards, and maintaining international data and tissue banks for use in various studies.
Our Innovation program funds a wide variety of research in programs accelerating technologies and innovation into products for the SCI community that make a difference in their daily lives.
BC Interior Outreach Initiative
One of ways Praxis combines the expertise of lived experience with clinical expertise to put knowledge into action in a very practical, hands-on way, is through our BC Interior outreach initiative. Our team hosts supplementary education sessions to help bridge gaps in care and knowledge about spinal cord injury. In these workshops, local clinical practitioners gain valuable insights from panel input by people with lived experience (PLEX). These sessions address the lack of specialized services for SCI, empowering practitioners with access to best practices and priorities in the SCI community.
To date, 32 SCI Workshops have been held in hospitals and other healthcare settings across the Thompson-Okanagan region. Workshop attendees are engaged with an informative presentation from the Praxis team of clinicians and people with lived
experience of spinal cord injury. There is always an opportunity for dialogue and questions, and an exchange of resources and information.
Some of the topics of the workshops have included SCI 101, overview of secondary complications of SCI, pressure injuries, PLEX perspectives, specialized equipment, transfers and vehicle modifications. We always welcome requests for specific workshops that are unique to the needs of each regional/rural community.
Praxis has received overwhelmingly positive feedback from the over 300 clinicians who have attended, and who report feeling much more confident and informed about many aspects spinal cord injury. They also report having a greater understanding of the lives, needs, and resiliency of people who live with a spinal cord injury.
On March 13 and 14th, 2024, Praxis held the BC Northern SCI Workshops in Prince George, British Columbia. The workshops brought together healthcare professionals and people with lived SCI experience to learn, share experiences, and build connections to support SCI health in Northern BC.
At least 27 participants attended in-person and an average of 50 attended via Zoom. Participants included occupational therapists (OT), physiotherapists (PT), and rehabilitation assistants working throughout northern BC in intensive care, acute care, rehabilitation, and community care. Additionally, a session was provided at UNBC for students and professors in OT, PT and medicine and education.
You can watch a video summary of this event and a publication describing these workshops is also available.
Indigenous Gatherings
Praxis Indigenous Liaison Richard Peter leads engagement and relationship-building with Indigenous community members who have a spinal cord injury or related disability. Richard has hosted four full-day Indigenous Gatherings in Vancouver, Kelowna, and Prince George. Community members are invited to hear Richard’s story of his experiences as a disabled Indigenous man, and to share their own lived experiences, along with its complexities, if they so choose. Later in the day, key community organizations and other service providers are invited to share information about their organizations.
These Gatherings are in part a collaboration with UNBC and SCI-BC.
There are plans for three additional events in BC this year: Richard will be returning to Prince George on Sept. 27th, Kelowna on Oct. 21st, as well as a date on Vancouver Island, the date and location yet to be determined.
Near-future plans include reaching out to Metis & Inuit people to build relationships and understand more about SCI and disability in these communities.
Richard would like to connect with Indigenous researchers and health care providers, as well as members of the Indigenous SCI and disabled community, both within BC as well as across Canada.
For more information on Praxis Indigenous Gatherings, or to get in touch with Richard, please contact: Richard Peter at rpeter@praxisinstitute.org or Spring Hawes at shawes@praxisinstitute.org.
What’s Next?
Planning is underway for several more workshops in the Thompson-Okanagan, as well as for a Kootenay Boundary road trip in early July, with stops in Nelson and Trail. The team is also planning to bring their workshops to Vancouver Island later in 2024. Additionally, training on best practices for SCI in acute care is currently being developed, incorporating Praxis’ work on standards of care, in collaboration with the experts from GF Strong and Vancouver General Hospital Spine program.
If you or your team is interested in attending a workshop, or inviting the Praxis team to your community, please contact Shannon Rockall, Regional Clinical Liaison for Praxis Spinal Cord Institute, at srockall@praxisinstitute.org. More information about Praxis Spinal Cord Institute here: https://praxisinstitute.org/
