On this episode of the FutureSeries, we speak with Erin! Erin Keough (M.Sc.Kin, M.Sc.A.PT., PT, MS2) is trained physical therapist and now medical student. Erin holds two master’s degrees: one in Kinesiology from Memorial University of Newfoundland and one in Physical Therapy from McGill University. Erin has taught multiple courses at Memorial University, and guest lectured at McGill University and the University of Valencia. Erin also received the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council award for her dedicated research on experiential learning through internships. Her current
In this episode, we speak with Lindsay Beavers and Codie Primeau on gender-affirming care in physiotherapy, who are faculty members and also members of the Queer Physiotherapy Collective. We discuss the existing gaps when providing care for the 2SLGBTQIA+ community and ways clinicians can better support gender diverse populations. Resources and links: https://www.instagram.com/chest_binding_support/ https://www.instagram.com/queerptc/ Https://linktr.ee/lgbtqphysio https://www.thegetrealmovement.com/theclinicfilm https://www.rainbowhealthontario.ca/education/training/
Welcome to a new series on the podcast, named the FutureSeries. It will be a space where we chat with physios, and others, about our uncertainties, our fears, and most importantly, our hopes in a more just and healthy world. We envision these conversations to have “less answers”, but more imagination and creation, centered around these questions. What concerns and uncertainties in the world do you have right now when it relates to physiotherapy and health? What does a healthier world look like to you? And how do you think physiotherapists/your profession can be a part of the solution? What cha
In this final Part 3, we speak with 2 guests. Amira Dirie is a registered psychotherapist, currently based on the East Coast of Canada. Sandra Ballantyne is a Canadian physiotherapist who has lived and worked in urban and remote areas of Canada, in Europe and in the Middle East. Early clinical experience in Lebanon and research in Palestine led her to graduate work in Community-Based Rehabilitation under conditions of political violence, completing a Palestinian case study. She subsequently practiced within CBR in Palestine, then returned to Canada, continuing to focus on community care. Sandr
In Part 2, we speak with Dr. Rachel Coghlan. She has over 20 years’ experience in public health, humanitarian response, and clinical physiotherapy practice, specialising in palliative care, neurology, oncology, and rehabilitation. She is a global leader on qualitative research and advocacy concerning palliative care in serious illness and injury in humanitarian settings, with a focus on armed conflict. Rachel has undertaken a PhD on palliative care in Gaza. Rachel is a storyteller who focuses on amplifying the voices and wisdom of those affected by illness, disability, or frailty, including du
In this Palestine Series, we sit down with three physiotherapists from Canada, the UK, and Australia, and a psychotherapist from Canada to explore their experiences with anti-Palestinian racism in healthcare systems. Together, we reflect on our personal and professional connections to Palestine, how the ongoing occupation across Palestine and ongoing genocide against Palestinians living in Gaza shape not only lives on the ground but also clinical and rehab spaces globally. In this series, we speak openly about discrimination, advocacy, and responsibility. We examine how politics enters healthc
This episode we welcome back Steph Lurch to talk about her recent 30 day Health Justice Series, that has been taking place across several of her accounts. If you liked this conversation, head to www.linkedin.com/in/slurch to check out the rest of the content. You can find out more about Steph Lurch here: Website: bio.site/stephlurch TikTok: medicine.needs.medicine Art Work as part of the Health Justice Series: Charmaine Lurch at clurch.com Bio: Stephanie Lurch (BScPT, MEd, Doctoral student) is a physiotherapist, educator, and health justice scholar with more than 30 years of experience at the
This episode, we are delighted to introduce our listeners to Zeina Abu-Jurji, our new co-host on the podcast. Zeina’s passion and commitment in advancing health justice was evident from the very first conversation we had, and we are excited to continue to bring more conversation about physiotherapy, rehabilitation and global health to this space. Read more about Zeina on our website, https://globalphysio.ca/about-us/.
Today’s guests are three second year physiotherapy students at the University of Manitoba: Emma De Guzman Caballero, Alana Lesperance and Gurkirat Gill. They talk about the literature review they conducted as part of their physiotherapy programme that focused on recommendations on how to provide environmentally-responsible community-based physiotherapy in Winnipeg. Bio: Alana Lesperance is a 2nd year MPT student at the University of Manitoba. She is passionate about health and wellness and was a high-level ringette player who played for the 2017 national ringette team that won gold against Fin
This episode, which was recorded in early 2024, features two physiotherapists, Adelaide Rusinga and Dr. Nathalia Costa, who share the learnings from their paper titled “Exploring the Systemic Structures that Affect Access to Physical Therapist Services for Non-Indigenous Black People in Australia.” Their research set out to explore the perspectives of non-Indigenous Black people when it comes to the physiotherapy profession in Australia. We discuss the intersection of race, whiteness and physiotherapy, and ways to move towards a more culturally aware and appropriate profession. Adelaide Rusing
Today’s guest is Ray Gates, an Aboriginal Australian (Bundjalung) physiotherapist with over 20 years experience as a PT and with Indigenous health. He was the first Aboriginal PT to become a member and later Chairperson of the Australian Physiotherapy Association’s (then) Indigenous Health Committee. He was a founder of the first Indigenous Physiotherapy Support Network in Australia, which later became the National Association of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Physiotherapists (NAATSIP). He has been involved with Indigenous health both in Australia and around the world in a variety of r
Today’s guest is Stephanie Lurch, a storyteller, activist, leader and physiotherapist. A dynamic award-winning educator, Stephanie has worked across multiple settings in the healthcare and education sectors, bridging the gap between academia and practice. Her career has been distinguished by a wide breadth of clinical, teaching and real-life experiences including working with the Cirque du Soleil, as part of a team of caregivers in West Africa, with Indigenous peoples in New Zealand, and currently as a paediatric physiotherapist in the public school system. She is an Assistant Clinical Profess
In today’s episode, the co-hosts interview Hilary Crowley who is a physiotherapist and an author. Hilary published a travel memoir entitled “Mini Saga in South Africa” about a year that she spent working around South Africa in the 1960s. This was during apartheid which started in 1948 and continued until 1994. Her experiences there led her to follow a career in paediatrics and overseas development work. It also formed the base of her interest in politics. Her previous books include Footsteps to Freedom, which covers 25 years of experiences volunteering in a community based rehabilitation progr
This episode, we are lucky to have Colleen, Margaret, Kirsten and Denise, who are all a part of the Community Rehab Program in Northern Ontario, Canada, share their experiences on the program. Community rehabilitation workers in this program are local Indigenous community members trained in providing rehabilitation to support Elders in their community. We talk about the Indigenous communities where this program takes place, the challenges in delivering rehab services in rural Ontario, and some important considerations when designing health programs for Indigenous communities. Resources: – Møll
Today’s episode is Part 2 of a two-part series featuring Tracy Blake (she/her). The only daughter of Trinidadian immigrants, Tracy and her youngest brother were raised in the multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-faith, working class neighbourhood of Rexdale in Toronto, on the traditional territory of many nations, including the Anishinabeg, Haudenosaunee, Chippewa, and Huron-Wendat peoples, as well as the Mississaugas of the Credit. Her 17-year clinical career includes providing acute inpatient care in the largest hospital system in Canada, community care to diverse populations ages 6 to 86 in
Today’s episode is Part 1 of a two-part series featuring Tracy Blake (she/her). The only daughter of Trinidadian immigrants, Tracy and her youngest brother were raised in the multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-faith, working class neighbourhood of Rexdale in Toronto, on the traditional territory of many nations, including the Anishinabeg, Haudenosaunee, Chippewa, and Huron-Wendat peoples, as well as the Mississaugas of the Credit. Her 17-year clinical career includes providing acute inpatient care in the largest hospital system in Canada, community care to diverse populations ages 6 to 86 in
Today’s episode focuses on the fascinating career of Jennifer Allen, a Canadian-trained physiotherapist who is a former Chair of the Global Health Division of the Canadian Physiotherapy Association. Jennifer has practiced and taught physiotherapy all over the world. Jennifer discusses her experience at World Physiotherapy Congress in Dubai in June 2023 and emerging roles for physiotherapists in the Canadian Red Cross Emergency Response Units. Resources: – International Centre for Disability and Rehabilitation (ICDR) – Jen Allen’s episode on The Project Health Wellness and Psychology Podcast –
Today’s episode, we have Alex Heilmann, a Masters student at UBC, studying Community Planning. He is from Boston originally and moved to Vancouver to study Planning, particularly Transportation Planning. His work and projects relate to transitioning cities away from car dependency. We cover a range of topics on how urban planning and city design impacts health, not just physical health, but social capital and environmental health. Resources: – War on Cars: https://thewaroncars.org/ – Strong Towns: https://www.strongtowns.org/podcasts – Happy Cities by Charles Montgomery – The Death and Life of
We, the podcast co-hosts, dedicated this episode to reflecting on how things have been going since the Global Physio Podcast relaunch in 2023. We express our gratitude for the many guests who have come onto the podcast. We discuss the successes as well as the challenges and lessons learned with the podcast. We talk about the ways we’ve changed as people and clinicians, and share some of the content we’ve been immersed in as of late. Stay tuned, there is a lot of great content coming up in 2024! Resources: – The End of Physiotherapy by Dave Nicholls: https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.
In this podcast episode, we speak with Bahareh Alexandra Hejazi about her experience and insights about her time spent in Italy, Palestine and Uganda. Despite international work offering many exciting prospects for health professionals and potential to create positive change across the globe, it is important to speak about the uncomfortable truths and complexities involved. Alex speaks candidly about the impact of power and privilege associated with professionals from the Global North, the often under-considered consequences and disruptions we cause to local communities with our “good intentio
Sara Abassbhay completed her Bachelor of Sciences in Rehabilitation and her Master of Sciences (applied) in Physical Therapy at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. Her career has taken her all over the world and she has practiced as a physiotherapist in Singapore, Ghana, and Canada. More recently, she was working in the Yukon Territory in northern Canada and on a Mercy Ship near Sierra Leone. Sara has also dipped her toe in animal rehabilitation. And this year, she will begin her PhD in the Faculty of Health and Environmental Sciences at AUT in Auckland, New Zealand. In addition to talking
While our profession has been female-dominated for most, if not all, of its history, leadership positions are disproportionately occupied by men. In addition, there are significant gender inequities with regard to the global unmet needs of rehabilitation. Women accounted for just over half of the 2.4 billion people worldwide living with conditions that would benefit from rehabilitation services according to data from the Global Burden of Disease Study conducted in 2019. So, why aren’t we talking more about gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) within rehabilitation? Today’s guests are he
Increasing diversity, equity and inclusion, commonly abbreviated as DEI, has been in the forefront of many sectors. Within health, providing culturally sensitive care and having a professional body that is diverse can lead to improved health outcomes. The conversation often involves ensuring clinicians practice cultural sensitivity during care, forming executive committees that are representative of the communities they serve, and developing health strategies that include the perspectives of groups with different positionalities. However, what if the curriculum in which we train our health pro
Today’s episode is all about reflexivity. The show co-hosts discuss their individual positionalities and examine how their lived experiences and socialization may influence the podcast. The show co-hosts share their dream of creating a podcast that is relevant to physiotherapists all over the world, amplifies voices that have been historically silenced and breaks down barriers with regard to knowledge translation. Ultimately, the hope is to bring together a community of curious physiotherapists who can learn from and inspire one another. Whether you’re a physiotherapist in the Global North or
The biopsychosocial model has been touted as an effective approach towards addressing physiotherapy-related health conditions for its ability to guide clinicians to think beyond biomedical factors. The shift to integrate subjective experiences, psychological and social aspects to understand a patient’s lived experiences is a step forward beyond purely patho-anatomical explanations of pain and disability. However, this model is not immune to critique and challenges. Today, our guest is Karime Mescouto (she/her/ela/dela), a Brazilian physiotherapist and a Postdoctoral researcher at RECOVER at Th
