Legacy Learning from Elder Doris Fox: Culturally Safe Care
Date and Time: Thursday, November 19, 2026 12:00 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. PCT
Location: Virtual Zoom Meeting
Moderator: Dr. Kendall Ho, MD FRCPC
In this special Indigenous Health Round, the late Elder Doris Fox of the Musqueam Nation shares stories from her healthcare journey and teachings on culturally safe care. This session invites participants to:
- Recognize the importance of creating safe and trusting spaces for Indigenous patients and their families through empathy, relational introductions, and respectful connection.
- Identify principles of respectful and culturally safe care that uphold patient dignity and can be incorporated into everyday interactions with patients.
- Reflect on opportunities to apply teachings from Elder Doris Fox to their own healthcare practices.
This event takes a different approach from other Indigenous Health Rounds. Elder Doris Fox passed away on May 21, 2024. This session is intended to honour her legacy and share her teachings.
iCON has partnered with Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) Indigenous Health to develop Indigenous Health Rounds, which serve as a platform to bring Indigenous voices to health care providers, policy makers and health administrators for knowledge sharing, dialogue, and brainstorming solutions to combat racism and foster culturally safe healthcare settings for Indigenous patients and families.
Each Indigenous Health Round is accredited for 1.5 Mainpro+® credits.
Developing Educational Tools to Support Cultural Safety
In 2015, Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) and iCON jointly created a video and facilitation guide featuring First Nations and Indigenous Traditional Practitioners, to share knowledge and promote culturally safe care.
Watch video hereA Coming Together of Health Systems
Community-based Cultural Safety and Healthcare Transformation Dialogues
Since 2016, iCON has partnered with Indigenous communities and health authorities to co-host community Dialogue Events, bringing together Indigenous communities, patients, local western and Traditional Practitioners and administrators to discuss health system transformation and integration of traditional practices into healthcare settings.
Three Dialogue Events have been co-developed and co-hosted across 2017 and 2018 to explore improving access to traditional healing practices. Specific objectives include to:
- Inform local health authority about best practices for incorporating traditional healing practices from a community and physician perspective.
- Improve health professional understanding of traditional healing and the role of traditional practitioners.
- Introduce traditional practitioners’ perspectives to shift practices and incorporate traditional healing into delivery of health care in acute care.
- Invite Indigenous patients, caregivers and communities to share their perspectives and vision of attaining health and wellness.
- Identify areas for improvement in current processes in hospitals, emergency departments and other acute settings in BC to honour patient requests for access to traditional practitioners.
Header photo caption: Reconciliation Pole, Hereditary Chief 7idansuu (James Hart), Haida, photo credit to Hover Collective / UBC Brand & Marketing
