Photo Credit: UNBC

By Sam Bennison

Sciences

UNBC professor is bringing humanity into healthcare through groundbreaking research

Mar 13, 2024 | 12:03 PM

PRINCE GEORGE— Art allows people to express their unique points of view and share difficult thoughts and emotions that cannot be expressed through traditional langauge. For Dr. Sarah de Leeuw, a UNBC professor in UBC’s Northern Medical Program (NMP), art can improve communication between patients and healthcare providers.

Dr. De Leeuw has been reappointed as the Tier 2 Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Humanities and Health Inequities. In her position she’ll continue to explore how arts-based health reasearch can address disparities in healthcare, breakdown barriers between patient and providers, and improve care.

“I have always been interested in the art of health and medicine, and this area of research has seen an increased emphasis around the world,” says Dr. de Leeuw.

As a Tier 2 CRC, Dr. de Leeuw will take her research to the international stage. She will work with global teams that investigate health humanities and arts as a means of humanizing medicine and healthcare.

“Over the next several years, my work will help ensure the incredible strengths in health humanities in Canada are shared with the world. In Canada, we have a lot of anticolonial and critical health knowledge,” continues Dr. de Leeuw. “I hope to develop an expanded evidence base regarding arts in healthcare. I will build open access teaching tools for people in healthcare who want to combat bias. I hope these arts-based tools will serve those who want to expand anti-colonial way of knowing and being. “

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Dr. de Leeuw goes on to say her research will build a fundamental base for the next generation of health professionals to humanize the healthcare system and provide a better patient experience.

When Dr. de Leeuw first began work with the NMP in 2008, pursuing health research through an arts lens was mostly unknown. As a social scientist, writer and poet, she’s passionate about ensuring the human experience remains in healthcare.

“It’s about understanding that health professionals and patients have complicated and often messy stories. Everyone, on all sides of the gurney, so to speak, needs to be kind to each other,” says Dr. De Leeuw. “We don’t always know everyone’s full story but understanding that stories are innate to both patient and providers means there’s more room to connect and to empathize with each other. It’s an opportunity to think creatively and in fresh ways about relationships within health care.”

The CRC Program is a federal initiative to attract and retain exceptional scholars in reasearch fields spanning engineering and the natural sciences, health sciences, humanities, and social sciences. Tier 2 CRC appointees are awarded $500,000 over five years to continue their emerging research that has the potential to lead in their field.

“Dr. Sarah de Leeuw shines an important light on the critical need for humanities-focused health research,” says Dr. Paula Wood-Adams, Vice President Research and Innovation at UNBC. “Her ongoing dedication to mobilizing knowledge on this key issue is helping to build a foundation for local and global change in patient care delivery.”

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Email: sam.bennison@pattisonmedia.com