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CFAN News
Welcome to Canadian Family Advisory Network's home
on the Internet. Please click through to the
links on the left to find out more about our national organization
for paediatric patient and family advisory groups.
This page is all about what's new in our world - events,
articles, and conference information. Please come back
and visit often as this page will be updated regularly!

October 26, 2009
Post CFAN Workshop in Halifax - A list of kudos and thank you
A summary of the CFAN workshop, complete with loads of links and attachments, will be up on the website soon. In the meantime, I wanted to say a thank you to all the people who pitched in to make the CFAN Workshop a rip-roaring success. Our evaluations were awesome (the collated results will be posted too), and the entire day on Sunday October 18 was a true team effort.
Thank you to:
All the IWK members for their warm hosting abilities and for their generous gift of a package of Bannock for each participant! A particular shout out to Chuck Livingstone and Robin England for starting the day of right with round table introductions and the tattoo icebreaker
Allana Sylliboy – for her ‘inside connection’ for our CFAN dinner at McKelvie’s on Sunday night!
Kim Pittman from IWK for taking conference notes and assisting with handouts
Sharon Willey for presenting useful advice about rejuvenating advisory councils and for taking the official CFAN photos.
Ruth Hartanto for so generously lending her daughter Sydney’s name to Sydney’s Spot and introducing our speaker
Lisa Hawthornthwaite for introducing a speaker and generously helping out with printing
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Angie Christman for greeting and helping with logistics
Frank Gavin for his skillful facilitation of the best practice session and his many years of laying the foundation as CFAN Chair for the workshop day
David Nicholas for his work to secure the ethics review, arranging consent and documenting the afternoon session
Tamara Krbavac and Bruno Geremia for their welcome addition to the CFAN Steering Committee meeting on Saturday night
Elaine Orrbine and CAPHC for their generous support of the workshop room, AV and catering and their ongoing support for CFAN and ensuring family and youth voices are heard
Craig Potvin from Purple Dog Events for making sure our day ran smoothly
ALL 38 participants of the CFAN Workshop day for lobbying and securing funding, arranging childcare, taking time off work, travelling across the county, and participating so openly in the workshop day
Kudos to the parent speakers of CFAN and CAPHC:
Donna Thompson – for so eloquently sharing her children’s story, and reinforcing the power of stories
Ann Hovey – for her professionalism, attention to detail and humour in talking about her Grand Rounds experience
Valerie McDonald – for speaking so clearly during the youth panel, where a parent’s voice was also needed
Joanne Ganton – for knocking it out of the park and speaking on behalf of all us parents at CAPHC
Ian Brown – for letting us glimpse into his son Walker’s world.
And to Sue Robins for leading such a worthwhile and inspiring
learning and networking event. |

July 9, 2009
Edmonton Down Syndrome Society Parent to Parent Support Program
Learn about the parent to parent support program with the Edmonton Down Syndrome Society through a heartfelt interview with Sue Robins, a visiting parent. Sue's passion for her unpaidwork is so inspiring! She's a true gem and CFAN is so fortunate to have her leadership.
» http://bloom-parentingkidswithdisabilities.blogspot.com/2009/07/at-dark-time-bringing-light.html

May 22, 2009
ARTICLE - An imaginative partnership: Parents and the doctors who care for their children
We are very proud to announce the recent publication of an article written by Frank Gavin, CFAN past chair, in the May/June 2009 issue of Paediatric and Child Health.
Frank wrote an insightful piece entitled: “An imaginative partnership: Parents and the doctors who care for their children.” It includes content from many CFAN members who responded to an email from Frank asking about what families needed from their pediatricians.
Here’s the link to the » table of contents – scroll down until you see Frank’s name under Commentaries to download the article.

May 22, 2009
NEW! CFAN Backgrounder
For a general information sheet about CFAN, who we are and
what we do, »
click here.

May 18th, 2009
Update: Canadian Child &
Youth Health Coalition
The Canadian Child and Youth Health Coalition, of which CFAN
is a member, recently welcomed two new members: SafeKids Canada
and the The Canadian Paediatric Society. These new partners
enhance the ability of all the member groups to extend their
reach and advocate more effectively. This will certainly apply
to the Child and Family in the Healthcare System project that
CFAN is leading within the Coalition. Before the summer begins,
the project working group will survey hospitals and family
groups across the country about parental presence at induction
and in recovery and about surgical preparation programs. We
look forward to the responses. As well, CFAN member groups
will soon be asked to identify particularly innovative models
of care as part of the Coalition's "Child Health Human
Resources" project. And in October the Coalition's annual
symposium will focus on ways to advocate more effectively
with governments, a topic that should interest CFAN members
given what is often at stake for families and how families
participate or are used in many advocacy efforts. More information
about the coalition is available at www.ccyhc.org

May 18th, 2009
"Parenting Matters!"
In March, the Canadian Institute for Health Research (CIHR)
approved a multi-year research project, "Parenting Matters!
The biopsychosocial context of parenting children with neurodevelopmental
disorders in Canada", that has been supported by and
will continue to involve (as members of the research advisory
group) three parents with CFAN ties: Joanne Ganton, Frank
Gavin, and Sue Robins. In a nutshell, the project will look
at what affects the parenting of the broad range of children
with neurodevelopmental disorders and and what parenting affects.
Drs. Peter Rosenbaum, Lucy Lach, and Dafna Cohen are the principal
investigators on a team of nine other doctors from various
disciplines. CFAN will help facilitate the participation of
many other parents. Stay tuned!
April 29, 2009
Mark your calendars: 2009 Annual
Workshop
Sunday October 18, 2009
We welcome you to join other CFAN members at our annual
workshop. This is a great opportunity to:
- Meet family representatives and health providers working
in patient/family collaboration from across the country.
- Learn from the work others are doing in similar areas.
Gain knowledge sharing, best practice examples, advice,
and support.
- Learn from parent and staff speakers.
- Create your own database of contacts and colleagues across
the nation to support the work you do.
. » Click
here for details

April 9, 2009
Creating a Patient and Family Advisory Council
A new educational webinar hosted by the Institute for Family-Centered
Care
Join this webinar to discuss how to create and sustain a
patient and family advisory council for your hospital or health
care organization. Developing partnerships with patients and
families as advisors is a good investment for your organization.
Next session: Tuesday, April 28th, 2009,
1:00-2:30pm (EDT)
For more information, please »
click here.

March 4, 2009
Peer Support Programs
Interested in Peer Support Programs? Here are two upcoming sessions – one in California, and another in Calgary that can be accessed via videoconference, featuring Karen Wayman, a noted speaker on Family Centered Care from Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford and Michele Ashland, a Lead Parent Mentor.
» Advanced Practitioners of Family-Centered Care: Upcoming Forums for Spring 2009
» Self-Efficacy and Packard Children's Hospital's Parent Mentor Experience
» Family to Family Connections: When Parents Need Support

February 25, 2009
New CFAN Logo
We would like to extend a big thank you to Melissa Clulow, our Webmaster extraordinaire, for finalizing our new CFAN logo. Special thanks to Susan Greig, Family Liaision for Partners in Care at BC Children’s Hospital, and former CFAN co-chair, for her initial initiative and work on the logo.

February 25, 2009
Films - Homecare for Children
CFAN was recently asked to help recruit families who might like to participate in a documentary film, now in production, about homecare in Canada. About a dozen parents from across the country expressed such an interest. The film's director and writer, Sheona McDonald, made a much admired earlier film, Capturing a Short Life. (www.capturingashortlife.com). More recently, we heard that another film about homecare for children is being made by Laura Sky. We hope both make a difference. Information about their openings and showings will be posted here.

February 25, 2009
Advocacy Project - The Child and Family in the Healthcare System
Just over a year ago CFAN joined The Canadian Child and Youth Health Coalition (www.ccyhc.org), and now CFAN is leading a multi-year Coalition advocacy project, The Child and Family in the Healthcare System. A twelve-person working group, chaired by Tamara Krbavac and Frank Gavin and consisting of five parents, three youths, the President of The Canadian Association of Child Life Leaders, the CEO of the Canadian Association of Paediatric Health Centres, and two hospital staff members is beginning to gather both data and narratives to identify existing exemplary practices and areas where improvement is very much needed. Annually and at the project's completion the working group and the Coalition will make recommendations to institutions and governments for changes that we think will improve the experience of families and patients. Visit this site again for ways that you can contribute to the project.

» Family Centred Care in Context - 2009 Conference
The Central and Northern Network for Child Health and Southern Alberta Child & Youth Health Network are co-hosting the second bi-annual conference on Family Centred Care May 24 – 26, 2009 at the Shaw Conference Centre in Edmonton. This conference follows upon the extremely successful 2007 conference in Calgary. » More info

October 2008
Congratulations to Frank Gavin!
At the CAPHC conference in October, our very own Frank Gavin was awarded the 2008 Contribution to Child Health Award. Elaine Orrbine, the President and CEO of CAPHC presented the award to Frank. It came as a total surprise to Frank, although many of the CFAN members knew the award was coming. Tamara Krbavac from McMasters did her best to contain Frank at the luncheon table to make sure he was there when his name was called!
On behalf of the CFAN Steering Committee, we want to say congratulations to Frank. Upon accepting the award, he said that he has done the CFAN work because he loved it, which caused many in the audience to well up with tears.
Frank has been the Chair and driving force behind CFAN for the past eight years. He has now stepped into the position of ‘Past Chair’ on the CFAN Steering Committee, and graciously continues to give of his time, expertise and heart to our national group. Thank you, Frank, for everything you’ve done and continue to do to move child and youth issues forward in Canada. |
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