INUVIK
Home support workers from across the Beaufort Delta and parts of the Deh Cho region converged on Inuvik from Nov. 3 to 7 for the first Beaufort-Delta Home Support Workers Conference at the Inuvik Regional Hospital.

Nearly 40 people attended the 2014 Beaufort-Delta Home Support Workers Conference last week at the Inuvik Regional Hospital. - photo courtesy of Peter Fair

The conference was the brainchild of Peter Fair, the manager of continuing care for the Beaufort-Delta Health and Social Services Authority.

"I'm so proud of what we've been able to do and to bring everybody together at this conference," he said. "The thinking behind the conference is that we have a lot of staff of well-meaning, hard-working people in the communities who have largely been neglected, especially in terms of their education."

Specifically, there have not been been many upgrading opportunities offered to these staff members, Fair said, largely due to the geographical size of the area served by the health and social services authority. Travel is both time consuming and expensive, Fair said, but increasingly that's not an insurmountable problem with the proper use of technology.

"It was clear these people are thirsty for knowledge," Fair said. "So I started using the Telehealth system to provide six weekly educational sessions. And I wanted to let them know they had the opportunity to be the eyes and ears of the community for health services, social service and mental health issues."

Nearly 40 people from the authority and the Deh Cho region attended the conference, which will be followed up with monthly education and training opportunities, Fair said. That includes 14 students from the personal support worker program at Aurora Campus.

"The conference was a way of bringing them all together, so they could share their own learning, that they could have opportunities to understand all the aspects of what we do. That's why we had them learn something about podiatry, diabetes and skin care and things like this.

"Sometimes they come across things and aren't sure what to do," Fair continued. "So the idea was to increase their knowledge and basically help them to do a better job."

Often, Fair said, the front-line workers are aware of problems that aren't realized by management.

He pointed to an increase in falls and broken bones among elderly people, this time of year in particular, as an example.

As the Arctic night closes in, more people suffer the injuries when they wake up at night, perhaps to go to the bathroom, and trip over something in the darkness.

Fair said the statistical trend was clear, but it was workers such as the home support people who provided the explanation.

Now, there are educational programs in place to encourage people to install night lights to help alleviate the problem, particularly motion sensitive lights that will only turn on when someone is stirring.

The conference also offered the chance for the participants to become certified in various work-related programs such as the workplace hazardous material information system (WHMIS).

"It's just building on the knowledge that they have and providing a structure," Fair said.

Another useful session included proper lifting techniques from the physiotherapy department, he noted.

Amy Chin, the home care co-ordinator for the Deh Cho, said she was "super-excited" to attend the conference.

"Here in the Beaufort-Delta is the model for the the rest of the territory," Chin said. "I'm pretty honoured and happy to have been invited. It's a lot of work to put something like this on."

The conference cost approximately $50,000 to organize, Fair said. The funding came from the Department of Health and Social Services.

We welcome your opinions. Click here to e-mail a letter to the editor.