Interviewee: Aysan Dehghani, Bachelors, College of British Columbia | Editors: Janielle Richards, Romina Garcia of Leon (Weblog coordinators)
Revealed: March 28, 2025
Are you able to inform us about your analysis?
I’m at the moment ending my bachelor’s diploma, and the analysis I lead is named IWASHRA’s Group Compass. The venture focuses on immigrant girls’s entry to sexual and reproductive well being in British Columbia. We’re exploring the accessibility and experiences of newcomer girls in the case of healthcare—all the things from discovering sources, to their interactions with healthcare suppliers, and the way they navigate the system. Basically, we’re how immigrant girls interact with the healthcare system and figuring out any boundaries they face.
The venture began as a directed-study underneath the steerage of my main investigator, Dr. Jemima afterwho’s a professor within the Geography Division at UBC. The venture developed right into a community-based initiative. It’s been working for about three years now, and our group consists of 4 researchers, together with a graphic designer who initially joined our group as we made it to the Map the System finals at UBC, and who has continued to assist us with displays and supplies.
Despite the fact that we’re within the strategy of writing a coverage transient with the CERC in Migration and Integration group at Toronto Metropolitan College, we’ve additionally been conducting workshops with the neighborhood. To date, we’ve held two main workshops, and the newest one centered on “journey mapping.”
Are you able to describe “journey mapping”?
Journey mapping is a visualization instrument we utilized in one among our workshops to higher perceive how immigrant girls entry healthcare sources, notably because it pertains to sexual and reproductive well being. It’s basically a timeline that traces their experiences—from the preliminary stage of looking for healthcare data, like the right way to discover a main care physician or testing facilities, during to receiving care and making suggestions on what enhancements could be made.
We had a proper dialogue within the bigger group, but additionally broke into smaller teams with tables of newcomer girls, the place we facilitated discussions. To make the workshop much more precious, we collaborated and invited neighborhood companions MAP, Prepared translation and Stable State Coop. We additionally invited a household doctor, Dr. Mei-Ling Wiedmeyer, from Umbrella Well being Co-Opto hitch us. She has expertise working with cultural well being brokers, so she understands the challenges confronted by newcomer girls in accessing healthcare.
Throughout the advice stage of the workshop, Dr. Wiedmeyer was in a position to filter the strategies and supply insights from her expertise as a doctor. For instance, she emphasised the necessity for adjustments to Canada’s “one-size-fits-all” healthcare mannequin. The present system doesn’t all the time meet the various wants of immigrant populations, and we have to adapt to these wants.
What led you to do that analysis?
I determine as a third-culture pupil. I’m ethnically Persian, however I’ve lived in a number of international locations, together with the UAE, Germany, and now Canada. My household moved to Germany proper in the midst of the European refugee disaster in 2015, and that have left an affect on me. I used to be despatched to a refugee camp to finish paperwork after we arrived, and I spotted how tough it was to navigate the system as a newcomer, even with all of the privileges I had.
This expertise sparked my curiosity in immigrant and refugee points. Throughout highschool, I even wrote my IB thesis on the political penalties of Angela Merkel’s determination to permit over 1 million refugees into Germany. From there, I centered my research at UBC on migrationwell being, and coverage, notably round how the healthcare system can serve immigrant populations. I additionally labored on the BC Heart for Illness Management on a digital sexual well being initiative referred to as Dishwhich additional fueled my curiosity in sexual well being and reaching particular populations with tailor-made sources.
At the moment, I’m additionally a trainee underneath the HER-BC group on the Ladies’s Well being Analysis Institute (WHRI), and dealing with an unimaginable all-female group that makes the analysis a lot extra significant.
The place do you hope to see this work in 10 years?
In terms of translating analysis into coverage findings, one of many largest challenges is feasibility. Is my venture relevant in the actual world? And whether or not will probably be accepted by the general public and the federal government. Analysis is essential, nevertheless it’s equally necessary to show that analysis into one thing actionable that may really profit communities.
One of many suggestions we’ve made is the creation of an built-in healthcare mannequin. Newcomer girls face very distinctive and complicated social determinants of well being, so multidisciplinary healthcare facilities that may handle these wants are important. Ideally, these facilities can be arrange in districts or areas, offering a mix of physicians, nurse practitioners, social employees, and counselors—multi functional area. This might permit communities to entry a extra tailor-made, complete healthcare system.
The problem, in fact, is the monetary side. However there’s already proof exhibiting that built-in healthcare fashions could be efficient. As an example, one of many leads at Stable State Co-OpMahado, is proposing a healthcare middle via the Mates Care Heartwhich may function a mannequin for the sort of community-based healthcare. I discover that extremely inspiring, and I hope to see this mannequin expanded.
In the end, in 10 years, I’d like to see this analysis translate into a totally built-in healthcare system that may meet the various wants of immigrant girls. By connecting public well being with coverage in a manner that is smart for these communities, we may create a system that actually works for everybody.
Further notable sources/organizations associated to this work:
Sustain with Aysan’s work on Linkedin
