UHN Health Talks: Sickle Cell Disease
Photo by @mayofi
To honour Sickle Cell Awareness Month, the RBCD Hub partnered with UHN Patient Education and Engagement to deliver a Health Talk on Sickle Cell Disease in September of 2023.
“With treatment and follow-up care, people with sickle cell disease can live long and full lives.”
The Health Talks
The Health Talks features:
Bethany M. – a 30-year-old Early Childhood Educator living with Sickle Cell Disease
Colleen Johnson – a Nurse Practitioner in the Red Blood Cell Disorders Clinic
Sinthu Srikanthan – a Social worker in the Red Blood Cell Disorders Clinic
Alina Rodrigues – Health Talks Host with UHN Patient Education and Engagement
“People have sickle cell and and they’re able to work … employers need to be more understanding that chronic illnesses are real. Invisible illnesses are also very real. I live with an illness that you can’t see on the outside but it’s very real on the inside.”
The Health Talk covers:
What is Sickle Cell Disease?
Care and Treatments
A Patient’s Experience – School, Work, and Advocacy
The Social context of Sickle Cell Disease in Ontario – Anti-Black racism, Disability, and Income Inequality
Watch the Full Session!
“Examples that patients [Black patients with sickle cell disease] commonly tell us about their experiences of anti-Black racism in their care ... health care providers frequently treat patients with mistrust and as undeserving of care ... call security and may handcuff patients … patients are labelled as a drug abuser or drug seeker when they are seeking care for pain. And when patients advocate, they may be written off as an ‘angry Black person.’”
Learn More
UHN Foundation Story: Improving care for sickle cell patients in Black communities
CanHaem Consensus Statement on the Care of Patients with Sickle Cell Disease in Canada
In Their Own Words - Documentary on the experiences of people with Sickle Cell Disease in Toronto
UHN Patient and Family Libraries - Call 416 603 6277 or email twpfl@uhn.ca
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