By: Christina Torrealba (she/her), Graduate Student in Community Health and Epidemiology

From July 10th-13th 2022, Promoting Leadership in health for African Nova Scotians (PLANS) and Keknu’tmasiek Ta’n Tel Welo’ltimk (KW) hosted the Health Sciences Summer Camps for youth in grades 8-11. The camps are intended to increase interest in the health professions for African Nova Scotian/Canadian and Indigenous youth through interactive programming, hands-on activities, and personal and cultural development. As we prepare for another summer of camp, we wanted to share some words from Timi Idris (PLANS Manager) and RJ Roggeveen (KW Program Assistant), organizers of last year’s summer camps.

One of the goals of the health sciences summer camps is to increase representation and interest in health professions among African Nova Scotian/Canadian and Indigenous youth who are underrepresented in these professions. “These students are the next generation who can change that”, says RJ, “I hope our campers left with friendships, confidence, knowledge on health sciences, and what opportunities exist for them.”

For Timi and RJ, one of the highlights of the summer camp was the mentorship night, where campers were able to network with members of their communities who are current health professionals and students. “They were able to see representation first hand and ask as many questions as they could,” Timi said, “it was also a full circle moment as we had some mentors that participated in the camp previously either as campers or counsellors.”

Timi and RJ both hope that the summer camps will encourage students to follow their post-secondary goals and spark an interest in the health professions. “I hope they were able to see that there is a place for them in this field and that the community is rooting for them as they decide on the path they want to travel”, says Timi, “I hope they also remember that PLANS and KW would support through that process.”

Registration is now open for the 2023 Health Science Summer Camps and the PLANS Prep Institute! The health sciences summer camps were a huge success thanks to the involvement of so many people, and preparations from years past. Be sure to read Part 1 and Part 2 of the Summer Camp Stories series, and stay connected with our blog to hear about this year’s upcoming camps.

By: Dr. Rachel Ollivier (RN, PhD), Nurse Practitioner Student at Queen’s University 

The first-ever Queen Elizabeth Scholars Symposium, hosted on March 27th, 2023 at the McGill University Faculty Club, saw over 75 attendees (including 53 Scholars) gather to network, share inspiration, and promote innovation. The event provided a platform to hear about the work of a tremendously diverse group of individuals, each accomplished in their own right. With the Queen Elizabeth Scholars (QES) program now entering its eleventh year, many of the Scholars are continuing to push boundaries and foster excellence in a variety of sectors, including climate action, energy security, economics, health care, law, engineering, and other non-profit work.

Dalhousie was well-represented at the event, with attendees including QES alumni Ivan Okello (2018), Rachel Morgan (2015), Jeremy Ryant (2015), and myself (2018). While certain discussions revolved around naming critical issues, it was clear from the outset that each Scholar has set out to solve these issues in their own way. The event opened with an alumni panel, moderated by Ikem Opara and featuring Dal’s very own Jeremy Ryant, who is now a practicing lawyer at McInnes Cooper in Halifax.

The opening panel, featuring three QES alumni from across Canada. From left: Jeremy Ryant, Tahani Dakkak, Marina Melanidis, and Ikem Opara.

The event promoted idea-sharing among Scholars through various formal and informal breakout sessions. Some key takeaways from the symposium included:

• Defining health vs. wellness: These are very different terms. Using the WHO’s definition of ‘health’, we can see that it encompasses emotional, mental, and physical health. However, there are also limits to this definition. Each individual will have their own definition of health that is deeply personal. Health care policies and practices must acknowledge that people should, can, and will define health on their own terms.
• We must lead with joy. For example, the behaviour change that is required to protect our climate is currently framed as inconvenient, sacrificial, and negative. It doesn’t have to be this way- nor should it be this way. We need to reframe it as something that is enriching, fun, and positive, not as a ‘chore’.
• Education is an essential stepping stone to opportunity. As it stands, education is shaped to make you labour in a labour market, when it should be teaching you how to be a good person. We need to think of the things that make people human.
• There are multiple ways of knowing. To truly learn from and collaborate with one another, we need to eliminate the transactional nature of relationships. Looking at the epistemology behind local and/or Indigenous knowledge (both within Canada and abroad) is critical. Part of this change requires us to value different ways of learning. A PhD is not the only form of ‘expertise’.
• When discussing global funding bodies, such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, it is clear that funding must be put into pre-existing infrastructure. The country and community must be the ones to decide the priorities. This is essential to facilitating a ‘bottom up’ approach to global health work.

A group photo of the symposium attendees, taken outside the McGill University Faculty Club and Conference Centre. The event concluded with a cocktail reception, which was attended by several senior leaders at McGill, including Professor Martha Crago (Vice-Principal of Research and Innovation).

I would like to thank the Rideau Hall Foundation for supporting my attendance. Until next time!

By: Ariel Provo (she/her), MD Candidate 2025

The 2022 International Black Health Conference was held in Halifax from October 6-8, 2022. The health conference was a ground-breaking event that allowed community members and health care professionals to hear from Black voices about Black health. It was also a great opportunity to learn about all the different initiatives that are in our province, our country and around that world with the shared goal of decreasing the health disparities that Black people face. In this post, I’m going to summarize a few of my key highlights and take-aways from the conference.

First was Dr. Jonathan Metzl, a professor at Vanderbilt University. He delivered an amazing presentation on the pathologization of Black lives and how that has shaped the societal stigma around schizophrenia. He explained that in the 1920’s, roughly 9 out of 10 patients diagnosed with schizophrenia were white females, and by the mid 1960’s this had changed to Black males making up 9 out of 10 patients. This shift was not an isolated change, it happened in the cultural context of the civil rights movement, as well as the medical context of changes made to the DSM II. Such changes included switching feminine pronouns to masculine ones and changing the wording from being more passive to more violent.

Within this context, the institutions were also changed from the existing “hospitals for the criminally insane” into correctional facilities, where White females and patients with anxiety were allowed to leave, and Black “patients” were institutionalized. Within this social context, many civil rights activists were also labelled as having schizophrenia, including Malcom X and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

This summary only reflects a few notes that I had taken from the talk, if you are interested in more, I encourage you to check out Dr. Metzl’s book: “The Protest Psychosis: How Schizophrenia Became a Black Disease”.

Another notable session that I attended was about youth mental health, with Social Worker Lana MacLean. She touched on the term “operational defiance” which describes the situation many Black children face, as a reaction to their environment. They are then viewed as “acting out” and are expelled and pushed further to the margins. This reaction is a trauma response of Black youth, which Lana said can be referred to as the new schizophrenia. Without addressing the trauma and reasons behind the behaviour, this cycle perpetuates. She also touched on the time and personnel constraints that make seeing Black mental health professionals difficult, as well as recognizing the importance that Black people are not a monolithic community.

Similarly, Michelle Williams, outlined the importance of recognizing African Nova Scotians (ANS) as a distinct people, the shared history of our ancestors, and how their arrival helped shape the Nova Scotia that we know today. I invite you to read more about Dalhousie’s African Nova Scotian strategy here, to learn more about the steps Dalhousie is taking to uplift ANS students.

Fun fact: Did you know that as late as 1962 over half of Canada’s Black population lived in Nova Scotia? (Source: Michelle Williams’ presentation).

During the remainder of the conference, we heard from experts from across Canada, the Caribbeans and the UK, and their efforts to decrease the barriers to health that Black people face globally. Particularly, we heard from a lot of community-based care programs coming out of Ontario that look at the specific needs of the community they’re working in and strive to fill those specific gaps instead of coming at the problem with a more general approach.

After attending this conference, I have a greater understanding of our responsibility as the next generation of physicians to create health centres and programs that promote safety, inclusion, and community collaboration to help fill the gaps in our health care systems. Attending the 2022 International Black Health Conference was and amazing opportunity; I learned so much from healthcare providers, community members, and policy makers, and I look forward to future innovations in Black health.