Sts’ailes Longhouse Program Creates Cultural Safety

Sts’ailes has a longhouse program and Fraser Health puts probably 160 to 180 people in there twice a year to learn about culture and have a meal with the population, and learn their teachings…[This is offered] throughout Fraser Health so for the whole Health Authority you can sign up and go. So we go there and they teach us. So there’s a general cultural sensitivity but they’ve also put on a program for dealing with end-of-life issues so that you learn the traditions so you don’t mess it up when you’re in the hospital. I don’t know if you ever have gone to those things but – [they are] phenomenal…we can actually go into community and they [Fraser Health] pay and [there is] a big salmon feast and you get taught…[it lasts] a full day…And out of that have come other things. Like, recently we had our CEO and a couple of the senior physicians and a couple of us more junior people [were] blanketed by Seabird Nation, so yeah. It’s been really neat and the outreach over the years I’ve worked in this community – I’ve [been] blanketed twice now by Seabird and two other communities and it’s just because of the relationships you build and – that they develop trust and respect [for you].