Attendee, Diversity in Engagement Learning Exchange

Creating a Canadian health care system that is accessible and treats all with dignity starts with respecting the voices of all who access services. The BC Patient Safety & Quality Council is seeking two patient partners to join them in Ottawa to explore important questions in developing a national patient engagement diversity framework.

Open to: Patient partners across the province

Lead Organization or Department

BC Patient Safety & Quality Council

Aim

To engage patient partners from BC in a learning exchange to:

• share emerging practices from across Canada in the field of patient engagement that seek to capture the experiences of patients who reflect those populations served;
• discuss opportunities and challenges reaching diverse populations; and
• contribute to the development of a framework to guide the work.

Level of Engagement

This opportunity is at the level of involve on the spectrum of engagement. The promise to you is that the health care partner will involve patients in planning and design phases to ensure ideas or concerns are considered and reflected in alternatives and recommendations.

Eligibility

• Experience working as a patient partner in engagement opportunities
• Comfort speaking with a diverse range of health care providers, leaders and other stakeholders about your patient engagement experience
• Special consideration will be given to those patient partners representing a range of age, gender, medical and patient engagement experiences, ethnicity and backgrounds

Logistics

Vacancies: Two (There will be a total of three patient partners from PVN invited, one who has been confirmed has been participating as a member of the planning committee for this learning exchange) Location, Date, Time: The event will start on March 4 for an evening event with keynote speaker and the full-day event will be on March 5 at the Delta Hotel in Ottawa.  

Reimbursement

Expenses such as mileage to airport, airfare, meals and hotel will be covered and pre-booked when possible.

Background

While patient engagement efforts have been rapidly evolving and expanding across all levels of the health care system in Canada, organizations recognize that many of these efforts do not necessarily capture the patient populations that they serve. We seek to learn from those organizations that have implemented novel methods to better understand the experiences of care of patients from diverse backgrounds, and how they have used these experiences to drive improvement efforts and further engage with broader segments of patients whom they serve. Issues of equity and diversity are apparent in all sectors of life, and notably so within the domain of health as demonstrated by disparity in health outcomes across different segments of Canadians. Increasingly, health equity has been a focus of health care and health organizations across Canada, with considerations of providing equality and equity of care to all populations. Similarly, efforts in the field of patient engagement have been rapidly evolving and expanding across all levels of the healthcare system in Canada, yet these efforts do not necessarily capture the patient populations served within the health system. The aim(s) of the event:

1. To share emerging practices from across Canada in the field of patient engagement that seek to capture the experiences of patients who reflect those populations served, and have used these experiences to drive improvements (e.g. develop/re-design services to meet patients’ needs)
2.  To discuss the opportunities and challenges to reaching out to and engaging with patients from marginalized, vulnerable, ethnoculturally and linguistically diverse populations.
3. To develop principles/framework that can be used to guide our engagement work with diverse populations
4. To build capacity of PE leaders to consider varying methods of engagement and principles that can guide this work that will be shared locally

The audience: Patient engagement leaders in national/provincial/regional organizations across Canada (e.g. quality councils, regional health authorities, national health organizations), patient and family advisors.

Engagement Leader Contact Information

Carol Stathers
Engagement Leader, Patient and Public Engagement | Okanagan, Interior Region
778.516.3308
cstathers@bcpsqc.ca