Culturally appropriate and safe assistance through home visitation for survivors of violence: Practices, challenges, needs – Report, July 2020

This report is a qualitative exploration of practices, challenges and unmet needs in Home Visitation (HV)-based supports to diverse mothers living in situations of family violence in the Canadian province of Alberta. ​It is an instrumental output of a 2019-2023 collaborative multi-agency project. The report provides evidence to develop and pilot a home visitation protocol …

Cultural Safety

Introduction In Canada, Brian Sinclair's tragic death in 2008 has been a turning point in the conversation on racism, discrimination, racial/cultural profiling and how they impact access to and delivery of care. It’s been almost six years [in the fall of 2008] since Brian Sinclair wheeled himself into the emergency room at Winnipeg’s Health Sciences …

The COVID-19 Pandemic and Gender Based Violence (GBV) in Canada (with some notes on Alberta)

The emerging evidence is that the COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated gender based violence (GBV; including family violence FV, which is intrinsically gendered) and adversely impacted anti-violence efforts worldwide (ACWS (Alberta Council of Women’s Shelters), 2020; Hankivsky & Kapilashrami, 2020; Peterman et al., 2020; UN Women, 2020; World Health Organization, 2020). The pandemic has disrupted funding …

The Moment

A woman kneels, hands outstretched against the moment. The hands of the clock are slow, unhurried as a vulture's wings across a molten sky, tracing a shadow on the bared neck. The hands on her are sure, as they dismantle her, bit by bloody bit, down to her hands clutching her tattered map to refuge …

Home Visitation as “Pretervention” of family violence

Background Historically, perinatal home visitation (HV) programs have been used to reduce risks for poor pregnancy outcomes, improve parenting skills and enhance infant development. The core content of most perinatal HV programs includes: (1) anticipatory guidance (2) curriculum-based tips for enhancement of parenting and/or child development (3) social support and practical assistance to mothers (4) …

Key steps in managing the client-case worker relationship – Tripat Kaur, Val Cudmore

PART A Informal Sharing Informal Sharing is a process that allows the client to talk freely and share their thoughts with greater confidence. This helps the client and counselor in the following ways: It provides an opportunity for the counsellor to know more about the client and their problems. All clients need to be listened …

Asylum

This is  for those who think that going to shelter is the complete and final answer for women facing violence, the perfect solution for women caught in the nowhere land between the violence in their homes and the uncertainty of shelter space.   Noise is a myth here, like dust and sweat. Silence – but …

Engaging boys and men in anti-violence efforts

There is a recognized need to mobilize boys and men as allies against gender violence (which presents in diverse forms, in family violence, intimate partner violence, sexual assault in and outside the family, homophobic and transphobic violence, and diverse forms of gender discrimination through the lifespan) (Barker et al and WHO; 2007).  In the time …

Critical Time Intervention – A model to enable transition to sustainable living

Introduction Critical Time Intervention (CTI) involves a phased and time-limited (9 months) approach to community-based rehabilitation of a vulnerable client towards independent and sustainable living. It is specific to the period of transition of the person moving from a shelter or hospital ward to living in the community and its implementation involves a planned and …

Access to childcare and its relationship with prevention of violence against women

Introduction: Availability vs accessibility of childcare The provision of childcare is inseparable from the achievement of gender equity, as well as the issue of improved systemic capacity to foster women’s ability to rebuild their lives after the experience of violence.  Over the last decades, the need and demand for child care have grown steadily. Access …