Research to reinvigorate Traditional Healing Systems a ‘professional and personal’ responsibility

Dr. Lana Ray is working with Indigenous communities to revitalize Traditional Indigenous Health Systems to reduce non-communicable diseases

As the newly appointed Canada Research Chair in Resurgent Methodologies for Indigenous Health, part of Dr. Lana Ray’s research explores how to revitalize Traditional Healing Systems to address the high rates of non-communicable disease that are a result of system inequities. 

“Traditional Healing Systems have been disrupted by colonialism—often to the detriment of the health of Indigenous Peoples, who before invasion experienced low rates of cancer and other non-communicable diseases,” explained Ray, an associate professor in Athabasca University’s Faculty of Health Disciplines. 

Today, the overall population in Canada is experiencing declines in rates of some types of cancer. “In First Nations communities, we’re seeing the opposite trend,” said Ray, based in Thunder Bay, Ont.

Ray combines Indigenous research methods and implementation science approaches in her research. What attracted her to implementation science is that its main focus is on how to effectively implement health interventions that are proven to work.

“Traditional Healing Systems have sustained us from time immemorial. We know they work,” she said. “The research I do begins with the premise that Traditional Healing is a wise practice and looks at how communities and institutions can support and implement those systems.”

Revitalizing Indigenous systems

Ray's work involves collaboration with First Nations communities. One collaboration, the Waasegiizhig Nanaandawe'iyewigamig Mino-Bimaadiziwin project, is being conducted in partnership with Waasegiizhig Nanaandawe'iyewigamig, an Indigenous-governed health centre that serves local First Nations and the urban Indigenous community in the Kenora and Dryden regions of Ontario and Traditional Healers from northwestern Ontario and Manitoba.

The five-year project is funded by the Canadian Institute of Health Research and Global Alliance for Chronic Diseases and focuses on cancer prevention and, to some degree, cancer treatment involving Traditional Healers, Indigenous Knowledge Holders, and traditional medicines. 

One of the ways the project aims to revive traditional practices is by teaching community members about plant medicines. Participants learn knowledge, skills, and protocols to harvest plant medicines in respectful and sustainable ways as well as how to utilize the plants to improve the health and well-being of their families and communities. 

Ray said that doesn’t mean participants will come away from the camp as healers, but it’s an opportunity to learn about systems long disrupted by colonialism.

“It's very different going to medicine camp and going to medical school,” she explained. “We learn in different ways, so understanding about Anishinaabe learning systems within the context of health is part of it. It’s very much wholistic learning.”

We learn in different ways, so understanding about Anishinaabe learning systems within the context of health is part of it. It’s very much holistic learning.

Indigenous data sovereignty

Indigenous data sovereignty is another major focus of Ray’s work, and working with communities on ownership, control, access, and possession of data.

Indigenous Peoples have always had ways to manage, store, and transmit data. Stories, she said, are an example of a traditional way to share knowledge and history.

“There were stories that may be owned by particular families, owned by particular people in the community, and it was their responsibility to know those stories. Those are all forms of data management.” 

One of Ray’s aims is to understand the processes and protocols used to manage that data and work with Elders and other community members to determine what’s appropriate to merge with Western methods of data storage.

“How can we support creating tools to support communities and making decisions about their data?”

‘Our responsibility’ to carry on from prior generations

While there has been progress in recognizing the negative effects of colonialism on the health of Indigenous Peoples and addressing systemic problems such as racism in health care, Ray said even the best anti-racism programs are limited in impact because, ultimately, they’re outside the control of the community. That’s why revitalizing Traditional Knowledge and Healing Systems is so important—to her research and as a personal calling. 

“It's our responsibility to retake up that work, carry on what our prior generations have been able to sustain, and really build on that towards the resurgence of our knowledge systems. So to me, that work, it's my professional work, but it's also very personal.”