Medicine has triumphed in modern times, transforming birth, injury, and infectious disease from harrowing to manageable. But in the inevitable condition of aging and death, the goals of medicine seem too frequently to run counter to the interest of the human spirit. Nursing homes, preoccupied with safety, pin patients into railed beds and wheelchairs. Hospitals isolate the dying, checking for vital signs long after the goals of cure have become moot. Doctors, committed to extending life, continue to carry out devastating procedures that in the end extend suffering. Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession's ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families. Gawande offers examples of freer, more socially fulfilling models for assisting the infirm and dependent elderly, and he explores the varieties of hospice care to demonstrate that a person's last weeks or months may be rich and dignified.
Medicine has triumphed in modern times, transforming birth, injury, and infectious disease from harrowing to manageable. But in the inevitable condition of aging and death, the goals of medicine seem too frequently to run counter to the interest of the human spirit. Nursing homes, preoccupied with safety, pin patients into railed beds and wheelchairs. Hospitals isolate the dying, checking for vital signs long after the goals of cure have become moot. Doctors, committed to extending life, continue to carry out devastating procedures that in the end extend suffering. Gawande, a practicing surgeon, addresses his profession's ultimate limitation, arguing that quality of life is the desired goal for patients and families. Gawande offers examples of freer, more socially fulfilling models for assisting the infirm and dependent elderly, and he explores the varieties of hospice care to demonstrate that a person's last weeks or months may be rich and dignified.
In this deeply moving feature-length documentary, three sisters and a brother meet for the first time. Removed from their young Dene mother during the infamous Sixties Scoop, they were separated as infants and adopted into families across North America.
Betty Ann, Esther, Rosalie, and Ben were only four of the 20,000 Indigenous Canadian children taken from their families between 1955 and 1985, to be either adopted into white families or live in foster care. As the four siblings piece together their shared history, their connection deepens, and their family begins to take shape. -website
"As a leading researcher in the field of biology, Robin Wall Kimmerer understands the delicate state of our world. But as an active member of the Potawatomi nation, she senses and relates to the world through a way of knowing far older than any science. In Braiding Sweetgrass, she intertwines these two modes of awareness--the analytic and the emotional, the scientific and the cultural--to ultimately reveal a path toward healing the rift that grows between people and nature. The woven essays that construct this book bring people back into conversation with all that is green and growing; a universe that never stopped speaking to us, even when we forgot how to listen"-- Provided by publisher.
This project is a collaboration between the Shared Care Committee (a partnership of Doctors of BC and the BC government) and the First Nations Health Authority.
Cultural Safety Committee of the First Nations, Inuit, Metis Advisory Committee, Mental Health Commission of Canada, Native Mental Health Association of Canada, Mood Disorders Society of Canada, Interior Health.
Vancouver BC:
Orca Productions | Moving Images Distribution
, 2010.
(DVD)
"Different voices from diverse cultural backgrounds share life stories about the paths travelled while navigating their experience of mental illness. Their messages are meant to serve as a catalyst for ongoing discussion to deepen our understanding of needs and experience of people who experience mental illness and, in particular, Aboriginal people and their families. They offer suggestions for a more holistic system that includes an approach of respect, not blame, and an understanding of their need for cultural reconciliation. A health care provider comments that respect for the patient's personal experience is an essential first step along the path to healing. This film is an initiative of the Cultural Society working group of the First Nation, Me´tis and Inuit Advisory Committee of the Mental Health Commission in collaboration with the Mood Disorders Association of Canada and the Native Mental Health Association." (Moving Images website)
Notes
Producer, Nicholas Kendall ; research and interviews, Emma Kendall ; cinematography, Nicholas Kendall ; production sound, Keet Neville.
Interviewees, Richard Chernier, Arthur Krumins, Patrick McKernan, Glida Morgan, Jade Morgan, Roberta Price, Anne Schretlen, Denise Taylor.
Opening remarks / Florence James, Penelakut First Nation -- Preface "Storywork" : foundations -- Nanaimo Indian Hospital : a patient remembers [British Columbia] / Sainty Morris -- Cold needles / Laura Cranmer -- 1. Tuberculosis -- 2. Indian health services, an evolving system -- Nursing Work at the United Church Hospital, Bella, Bella, British Columbia / Marge Thompson -- Nursing work at the Anglican hospitals in Aklavik and Pangnirtung / Biddy Worsley -- Director of Nursing at the Camsell / Elva Taylor -- 3. The Institutions -- Indian hospitals and field nursing -- Nursing at the Camsell / Marjorie Warke -- Occupational therapy student : Charles Camsell Indian Hospital, 1966 [Edmonton, Alberta] / Truus van Royen -- 4. Patients and families -- Life in and around the Indian hospitals -- A Patient's memory of Nanaimo Indian Hospital / Laura Cranmer -- Life as a patient in the Charles Camsell Indian Hospital / Alma Desjarlais -- A Patient and a worker in British Columbia Indian hospitals / Marie Dick -- Visiting the Nanaimo Indian Hospital / Delores Louie
SNUWUYULTH -- Local indigenous medicine -- A Conversation about the Nanaimo Indian Hospital / Violet Charlie -- Remembering Indian Health Services and Traditional Medicine on the Snuneymuxw Reserve / Ellen White -- 6. Working in health care -- Aboriginal nurses and caregivers -- Aboriginal nurse at the Camsell / Kathleen Stein hauer -- Nanaimo Indian Hospital -- Being a Patient and Becoming a nurse / Michael Dick -- Ward Aide and Office Assistant at the Nanaimo Indian Hospital / Violet Clark -- Nursing Aide at the Lac La Ronge Nursing Station / Muriel Innes -- Aboriginal people and Nursing -- Evelyn Voyageur
