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Aboriginal health concerns go to Ottawa Fort Smith nurse practitioner attends roundtable at Rideau HallPaul Bickford Northern News Services Published Monday, April 2, 2012
She is a member of the Canadian Nursing Association's National Expert Commission, which partnered with Gov.- Gen. David Johnston and his wife, Sharon Johnston, for a unique meeting on aboriginal health on March 27.
"We were doing a roundtable session on building strengths and taking action to improve health and healing in aboriginal communities," Lys explained.
The gathering of about 30 people took place at Rideau Hall, the Governor General's official residence.
"I did the keynote speech in the morning just to kind of set the stage for the day," Lys said, noting she emphasized that the health-care system is not addressing the determinants of health well enough.
"Basically what I said was that the health-care system that we have looks at physical and a little bit of mental health, but it does not look at the emotional and the spiritual health," she recalled. "In a lot of aboriginal cultures it's just that you need a balance between mental, emotional, spiritual and physical health to really be healthy."
Her 15-minute speech was shown on the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network and later she did a number of media interviews.
"That was quite an exciting day," she said.
Lys, who is of Metis heritage, noted a lot of intergenerational damage to aboriginal health has been caused by colonization and residential schools, which she said are at the core of the problem.
"Unless we address those and stop them from reoccurring, we can't re-establish that balance," she said, noting that has to begin with education and opening a dialogue.
In a news release, Sharon Johnston stated she and her husband have seen many successful initiatives in aboriginal communities during their travels across Canada.
"This fills us with hope and optimism for the future," she said. "But no amount of optimism will resolve all the problems faced by our aboriginal families. Education and health are the cornerstones of sustainable well-being for these communities and families."
The discussion at the roundtable focused on three areas - social, economic and environmental determinants of health; chronic disease; and children, parents and families.
Lys was one of three people from the NWT at the meeting. The others were Arlene Hache, executive director of the Centre for Northern Families in Yellowknife, and Sandra Lockhart, aboriginal wellness co-ordinator with the Stanton Territorial Health Authority.
"It was really significant that aboriginal people were at the table speaking about our health concerns and I think that's the only way that we're really going to change the health status of aboriginal people is to include them at that table," Lys said, noting programs developed without such input haven't been all that successful.
The National Expert Commission was launched in May of last year and it has been doing roundtable consultations with different groups across the country to determine what the nursing profession can do to improve health overall. The commission plans to release recommendations in June.
Lys said she was chosen for the commission because of her experience in aboriginal health and her work in the North.
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