The annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation on September 30th offers an opportunity to reflect on the ongoing work of advancing Indigenous cultural safety and addressing racism in health care. While this day provides a moment for reflection, our responsibility to hold licensees and ourselves accountable for the provision of safe and respectful care continues in every patient interaction every day of the year.
Anti-discrimination is foundational to our work. It informs our organizational culture, decision-making, and ensures that we are building processes to be accountable to patients through our standards and Quality Assurance Program. We recognize that meaningful progress requires more than individual initiatives; it calls for an ongoing commitment to learning, reflection, and action in the everyday work of our licensees – those who provide care to the patient.
This commitment includes considering how cultural safety, cultural humility, and anti-discrimination shape the experiences of patients who are Indigenous and influence the care they receive.
Supporting Learning Through Resources and Guidance
Continuing to learn about the impacts of colonialism, racism, and discrimination is an important part of advancing Indigenous cultural safety. This learning can help health professionals reflect on their assumptions, recognize barriers to care, and consider how their everyday interactions may affect patients’ experiences.
CCHPBC set the professional standard, Implementing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada Calls to Action, as the minimum requirement that licensees must meet to support safe and ethical care. The standard is part of Module 5 of the Learning Series: Putting Standards into Practice, offering guidance on reflective practice, identifying areas for growth, and integrating learning into day-to-day practice.
Small, thoughtful changes in practice can contribute to more respectful and responsive experiences for patients.
Putting It Into Practice
The College’s work on the Implementing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada Calls to Action brought together the professional standards of the legacy colleges into a harmonized professional standard, with a more intentional focus on implementing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s Calls to Action, reflecting an important step in this ongoing work. Building on the earlier standards and consultations with licensees who identify as Indigenous, the harmonized standard was further refined in collaboration with X’staam Hana’ax, Nicole Halbauer, an expert in decolonization and championing change in health-related sectors. This work reinforces the importance of embedding Indigenous perspectives into professional expectations.
Through a series of engagement sessions, the feedback helped shape these materials, informing everything from the wording and structure to the content. Their contributions helped ensure the information reflects the experiences, perspectives, and priorities of patients who are Indigenous.
We are deeply grateful to everyone who contributed to this work, especially our partners who generously shared their time, knowledge, and expertise.
An analogy that comes to mind is a cupcake: the batter is where the substance lives, while the frosting is what we see on the surface. In our reconciliation and anti-discrimination work, the batter represents the ongoing learning, reflection, and action needed to deepen our understanding of Indigenous histories, cultures, knowledge, and perspectives, and to examine how we can contribute to more equitable and culturally safe environments. The frosting represents the visible activities, such as ceremonies, acknowledgements, and awareness initiatives. These activities have meaning and value, but they must be supported by a strong foundation of learning and meaningful action.
By continuing to learn, reflect, and take meaningful action, we can contribute to a health care environment where cultural safety is embedded in the quality of care we provide.
Carin Plischke
Registrar and CEO