Progress Update – Summer 2020
April 2020
At the January 2019 in-person meeting in Thunder Bay, we had the opportunity to take a look at the first draft of the mortality analysis. After looking at the preliminary reports, we decided to take a deeper dive into three areas: mental health, injuries, and chronic diseases.
Over the past year, we contacted and met with content experts for each respective theme: (i) Dr. Paul Kurdyak, lead of the Mental Health and Addictions Research Program at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES), (ii) Dr. Alison Macpherson, Associate Professor in the School of Kinesiology and Health Science at York University with a research focus on injuries in First Nations and Inuit communities and an adjunct scientist at ICES, and (iii) Graham Mecredy, staff scientist at ICES with a research focus on Indigenous Health and chronic diseases and conditions. Dr. Jennifer Walker, Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Health at Laurentian University and Core Scientist at ICES was an integral part of the mortality analysis. She has agreed to oversee the next three analyses for the Mamow Ahyamowen partnership.
Three analysis plans were created under the guidance of the content experts, and we are sharing these plans with communities. We have received a number of community approvals from the communities who would like to participate in these three analyses and are waiting for a final few.
This work prepares us for a busy autumn, as we hope to begin one of the three analyses.