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Minomathasowin – Healthy Living

The Minomathasowin “Healthy Living” Public Health Department was generated as the result of a community-developed, and community-led public health model for the region, within the Weeneebayko Area Health Authority (WAHA).

With a wholistic approach, we are working with communities to understand the needs of individuals and families across the region.

We built partnerships to analyze the health access in the region that will support health planning. It allows for us to recognize the patients’ access in and out of the region.   

Working with regional experts, we support the development of community health planning while looking ahead for future generations.

The lack of specific regional health information has made it difficult for community health leaders to develop impactful community health plans and proposals to sustain meaningful change and service enhancements for their communities.  The access of regional health information within the James and Hudson Bay communities has been a long-standing challenge. 

In response to this, the Weeneebayko Area Health Authority (WAHA) Minomathasowin – Healthy Living department began exploring options for creating and sustaining partnerships with health research organizations such as ICES (formally The Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences) and Laurentian University towards the goal of providing community health leaders the information they need to meet the ongoing health needs and challenges within the region.  

Minomathasowin continues to identify public health priorities for implementation through health data collection and ongoing engagement with communities. Access to federal, provincial and First Nation databases has led to Minomathasowin’ ability to analyze regional demographics, health status reports, health trends and surveillance make it meaningful for communities to begin to access health information and work towards improving the quality of life for community members.

Department Timeline

 2017:

  • Held leadership and community engagement sessions that developed a new vision for public health in the James and Hudson Bay region.

2018:

  • Reviewed findings at a public health session
  • Received approval from communities’ Chief and Councils for the new vision of public health in the region
  • Signed a partnership agreement with ICES
  • Implemented Mustimuhw Information Solutions (MIS)

2019:

  • Hired a Data Analyst and Knowledge Translation Specialist
  • Released reports on Diabetes, Asthma, and Cancer trends
  • Held a health data workshop in Timmins, ON.

2020:

  • Mental Health Phase Two Analysis
  • ACES Reporting
  • COVID-19 modeling, surge capacity, daily reporting, and public health campaigns

2021:

  • COVID-19 ongoing reporting, campaigns, and community support
  • Mental Health Phase Two Report
  • Health surveillance analysis

Minomathasowin – Healthy Living Projects include:

  • Mustimuhw Information Solutions (MIS) – Communities across the region adapted an Information to help keep track of health information.
  • Mamow Ahyamowen (Partnership)
    Mamow Ahyamowen (meaning everyone’s voices) is an epidemiology partnership of Northern Ontario First Nations governed health service organizations. We work with our communities to identify important questions, we find and analyze data, then we interpret the data with our communities to help answer our questions and achieve health equity.
    • Learning from Our Ancestors – Mortality Experience of Communities Served by Weeneebayko Area Health Authority (May 2019). Through our partnership with Mamow Ahyamowen, we have developed a report entitled ‘Learning from Our Ancestors: Mortality Experience of Communities Served by the Weeneebayko Area Health Authority’. This report describes the mortality experience of communities in the James and Hudson’s Bay Region. To access a copy of the report, please visit WAHA Mamow Ahyamowen Mortality Report. To access the overall partnership level report, please visit First Nations Data Reports – Mamow Ahyamowen Partnership.
  • Mental Health and Addictions Report 2008-2017
    This report will encourage questions and help guide future decisions on health care in the region.
  • WAHA COVID-19 Modeling & Surge Capacity Planning for the region
    WAHA is working with each community we serve to keep the people of our region and our staff safe and healthy. Pandemic projections developed in March helped to drive decisions for the communities.
  • Daily COVID-19 Report
    Daily COVID-19 information from across the Northeastern Ontario and the region is assemble daily to better inform those living and travel in and outside of the region.

    Upcoming Projects
  • Annual Health Surveillance Report
  • Mental Health and Addiction Phase 2 Report for individual communities
Minomathasowin Public Health logo

Contact Information
Minomathasowin@waha.ca

Loretta Loon, AVP of Culture, Healing and Well-Being
Loretta.Loon@waha.ca

Rob Gagnon, Director
Robert.Gagnon@waha.ca

Justice Seidel, Senior Analyst, Research, Evaluation and Engagement
Justice.Seidel@waha.ca

Key partnerships

Laurentian University logo
IC/ES logo
Mamow Ahyamowen logo