Dear Colleague,

I am writing to invite you to contribute to an Open Education Resource on Northern and Indigenous Health and Health Care. This open access, online resource is being organized and edited by the UArctic Thematic Network on Northern Nursing Education, and will consist of approximately 50 short chapters from a variety of experts, academics and practitioners in northern and Indigenous health and health care from around the Circumpolar North, aimed at a 3rd year baccalaureate level. I am hoping you might be willing to contribute a 1000 word chapter for this project. The deadline for contributions is February 1, 2018. We are aiming to launch the Resource at the International Congress of Circumpolar Health in August 2018.

If you are interested, please complete this <5 minute survey by November 1, 2017 to indicate the topic you would be willing to contribute a chapter on. We will then follow-up with you and provide additional information including author guidelines.

https://fluidsurveys.usask.ca/s/northernopentextbooksurvey/

Our objective is to develop an accessible resource on health and health care from a northern perspective for the growing number of health professionals being educated in northern communities, as well as provide a useful tool to orient southern health professionals going to work in northern communities. We anticipate this will be a valuable and adaptable resource for the members of our Thematic Network on Northern Nursing Education, for other UArctic TNs and institutions, and for health care practitioners and students around the circumpolar North.

The learning objectives of this Open Education Resource include:

  • Understanding the unique health care needs and professional responsibilities that result from remoteness and population sparsity.
  • Identifying the social, environmental and cultural aspects of a community that inform and impact care needs.
  • Appreciating traditional and Indigenous medicines and approaches to healing as part of a holistic care system.
  • Exploring the similarities and differences in northern health care across the circumpolar region.

Open Education Resources are defined as: “teaching, learning, and research resources that reside in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use and re-purposing by others.”

Please feel free to forward this to other colleagues who might be willing to contribute to this project.

Thanks in advance for your support!

Heather Exner-Pirot
Coordinator, UArctic Northern Nursing Education Network
heather.exnerpirot@usask.ca