Facilitator & Consultant,
Raising the Profile Project 2017
The Raising the Profile Project launched a new era of health care delivery in BC, grounded in accessibility, integration and direct action with the complexity of today’s needs.
How to shift from acute health care delivery to integrated, community-accessible health collaboration has perplexed institutional health planners for some time. The Raising the Profile Project, led by Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives consultant Marcy Cohen in 2017, built relationships, collaboration channels, and a capacity model that’s being copied across Canada.
In my role I facilitated province-wide community consultations, co-wrote the infrastructure model, and moderated Summit panel dialogues with innovation leaders. I worked with appreciative inquiry, story mapping, creative dialogue and circle process, to gather the collaborators and the inherent knowledge in the system. Raising the Profile innovated a new era of adaptive, interconnected and relationship-based health care.
The seniors’ wellness sector grapples with pressing social change questions – “How we shape where we live and how we live so we can end isolation?” and “What is the role of older adults – soon 25% of the Canadian population – for a more connected world?”
The project launched partnership transformations in communities across BC, with civic & provincial governments, regional health authorities and elders’ social justice organizations, leading to wide-scale cross-sector innovations. The consultations set up collaboration relationships that match real-life complexity with care that includes the social determinants of health. The resulting call for community-based health systems development was clear: Develop a common language through participatory, integrative evaluation; Facilitate cross-sector mentorships; Build a knowledge & practice mobilization network; Recognise leadership in community-based health innovation.
At the unveiling Summit in November 2017, “Vive la revolution!” was a participant’s call during my closing comments.
www.seniorsraisingtheprofile.ca