Digital Health Canada is beginning a learning journey to understand how to support members in building better digital experiences that serve all Canadians.

We know that discussions of equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) are at the core of designing patient-centered healthcare experiences, and we want to help our members build the skills, networks, and confidence to lead this work across our ecosystem.

During this initial phase we want to learn how healthcare organizations in our ecosystem are already engaging in EDI work, and identify opportunities for how we might support professionals in our community.

Our process is driven by our community

We are excited to collaborate with the ON Canada Project’s team of EDI practitioners and community builders who will be leading our listening sessions alongside our CEO and Board Members. After a call for volunteers that resulted in 86 interested individuals putting their names forward, we built a 15-member task force of people from across the country to inform the survey and design listening sessions; a team of 20 ambassadors are helping amplify the survey across the sector.

Consent & Confidentiality

It is our goal to create a safe and open container for sharing your experiences navigating EDI work across your roles in digital health. The nature of a focus group is such that confidentiality cannot be guaranteed, however we have taken the steps to maintain confidentiality of the research data. All participants will sign consent forms and are asked to not repeat anything shared in focus groups. Any personal identifiers (name, organization) will also be removed in reporting.

Team

On Canada Project Team

  • Gina Uppal, Co-founder, On Canada Project
  • Sheliza Jamal, DEI Practitioner & Founder, Curated Leadership
  • Stephanie Rebello, DEI Strategist

DEI Task Force Leads

  • Abbas Zavar, Insights4Care Program Analyst, OntarioMD,
  • Adnaan Bhyat, Manager Virtual Services, Women’s Virtual, Women’s College Hospital,
  • Anjana Esparam, Call Center Volunteer, University Health Network
  • Camille Talag, OPS Program Analyst / Product Owner, Ministry of Children, Community & Social Services
  • Christine Kouri, Manager, Health Equity & Diversity, CHEO
  • Claudia Ngunu, Specialist, Office of Virtual Health, PHSA
  • Jill Veenendaal, Health Information Manager, Sioux Lookout First Nations Health Authority
  • Josephine De Leon, Epidemiologist, BlueDot Global
  • Lana Majid, Senior Manager, Maple
  • Lirije Hyseni, Manager, Knowledge Translation and Evaluation, eHealth Centre of Excellence
  • Mala Dorai, Senior Manager, PrescribeIT & Chair of D&I Committee, Canada Health Infoway
  • Navi Boparai, Senior Project Manager, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health
  • Raquel Dias, Research Associate, Nova Scotia Health Authority
  • Steven Slowka, Consultant, Care Partnership, St. Joseph’s Health Care London
  • Tanjeem Taha, Master of Health Informatics Student / Project Analyst, University of Toronto / Women’s College Hospital
  • Thiv Paramsothy, VP of Growth, Adracare (a Well Health company)

We are excited to collaborate with the ON Canada Project and the volunteer EDI Task Force Leads. We hope this task force can follow us into the next phase of this work, as determined by the outcomes of our survey and listening sessions.

Sincerely,

Mark Casselman, Chief Executive Officer, Digital Health Canada
Zen Tharani, Board Director, Digital Health Canada