A Browne
Biographic Data
| ID | 68733 |
|---|---|
| NAME | A Browne |
| GIVEN NAMES | A |
| FAMILY NAME | Browne |
| SIGNATURE | BROWNE A |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of British Columbia |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6320-4428 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 51 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 344 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 51 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1997 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 10 |
Aboriginal adults’ perspectives on talking with young people about sexual health and relationships in two communities in Western Sydney, Australia
This strengths-based study investigated Aboriginal adults’ views on young people’s sexual health, attitudes and relationships. Between 2019 and 2020, sixteen interviews were conducted with adults aged 25 and older from two Aboriginal communities in Western Sydney, Australia. In this paper, we discuss adults’ perspectives on intergenerational communication about sex in their communities. Participants highlighted intergenerational learning via talk…
Indigenous women’s health and data sovereignty
This article explores Indigenous Research Methodologies (IRM) in the context of Indigenous women’s health, integrating principles of Indigenous Data Sovereignty (IDS) and theoretical ideas from Critical Indigenous Feminism (CIF) and Red Intersectionality (RI). Building on ongoing critiques of dominant Eurocentric health research paradigms, we advocate for IRM to guide quantitative methods that typically exclude Indigenous Peoples and perspectives…
There’s just such a mismatch”
Our findings highlight the mismatches between how cancer services are currently designed and delivered, and the specific needs of people experiencing health and social inequities. These findings also point to organizations delivering cancer services as potential sites for transformation toward more equitable access to cancer care. Equity-oriented healthcare may offer a framework for service design and delivery to improve access to cancer care and…
Longitudinal effectiveness of a woman-led, nurse delivered health promotion intervention for women who have experienced intimate partner violence
Clinicaltrials.gov ID NCT03573778 (Registered on June 29, 2018)
Yarning as a method for building sexual wellbeing among urban Aboriginal young people in Australia
This paper describes the strategies used by Aboriginal young people to build positive relationships and sexual wellbeing. It does so to counter the risk-focussed narratives present in much existing research and to showcase the resourcefulness of Aboriginal young people. We used peer-interview methods to collect qualitative data from 52 Aboriginal young people living in western Sydney, Australia. Participants reported a strong desire to stay safe …
Next Steps in Decolonising Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Primary Health Care Policy in Australia
Following a failed 2023 referendum on constitutional recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, Australian governments must work with Indigenous leaders to chart a new way forward in policy to support Indigenous health and wellbeing. Here we report on key stakeholder views on what is required to decolonise Indigenous primary health care (PHC) policy. This article reports on qualitative research conducting yarns with 20 senior st…
Bringing an Equity Lens to Participant Observation in Critical Ethnographic Health Research
Critically-oriented health research often engages participants whose lives are shaped by structural inequities and structural violence. As scholars who engage in critical theoretical, praxis-oriented research, including research with social justice and decolonizing aims, we are cognizant of the histories of exploitation and structural violence often perpetuated through research. To engage in research that effectively promotes health equity, we ar…
Aboriginal young people’s perspectives and experiences of accessing sexual health services and sex education in Australia
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (Aboriginal) young people seek information and access health services for their sexual health needs. This study examined Aboriginal young people's perspectives on sexual health services and sex education in Australia. Overall, 51 Aboriginal people aged 16-26 years were interviewed by peer researchers in Sydney, Australia in 2019-2020. The findings suggest that the internet was used to assess information quick…
Social Suffering
In this paper, we present findings from a qualitative study that explored Indigenous people's experiences of mental health and addictions care in the context of an inner-city area in Western Canada. Using an ethnographic design, a total of 39 clients accessing 5 community-based mental health care agencies were interviewed, including 18 in-depth individual interviews and 4 focus groups. Health care providers also were interviewed (n = 24). Data an…
Equity-Oriented Care
Health and healthcare equity within the Canadian cancer care sector
Health and healthcare equity is a growing priority in the cancer care sector; however, conceptual clarity is needed to guide the development of robust equity goals, and the development of sustainable, measurable actions that redress inequities across the cancer control continuum. If we are to advance health and healthcare equity in the cancer care sector, a coordinated and integrated approach will be required to enact transformative and meaningfu…
Addressing anti-Indigenous racism in Canadian health systems
San’yas Indigenous Cultural Safety Training as an Educational Intervention
The San’yas Indigenous Cultural Safety Training Program is an Indigenous-led, policy-driven, and systems-level educational intervention to foster health equity and mitigate the effects of systemic racism experienced by Indigenous people in health and other sectors. Currently, San’yas is being scaled-up across Canada. This article focuses on the following: (a) the pedagogical underpinnings of San’yas grounded in transformational learning principle…
“I want to get better, but…”
These findings underscore several equity-oriented healthcare service delivery and clinician adaptations that are required to scale up DAAs among PWID living with HCV, including the provision of harm reduction-focused, non-stigmatizing, integrated, and peer-led care that responds to power differentials
Stigma is where the harm comes from”
Beyond deficit
Health research concerning Indigenous peoples has been strongly characterised by deficit discourse-a 'mode of thinking' that is overly focused on risk behaviours and problems. Strengths-based approaches offer a different perspective by promoting a set of values that recognise the capacities and capabilities of Indigenous peoples. In this article, we seek to understand the conceptual basis of strengths-based approaches as currently presented in he…
Letsemot, “Togetherness”
Connection to land has been identified as a central determinant of the health and well-being of First Nations in Canada. The wholistic, interconnected, spiritual, and sacred relationship that many Indigenous Peoples have with the land is an integral part of strengthening physical, spiritual, mental, and emotional health and well-being. However, there has been little empirical evidence on how to assess, measure, and report on connection to land fo…
Interrogating play as a strategy to foster child health equity and counteract racism and racialization
In our 2014 article, ‘A Critical Reframing of Play in Relation to Indigenous Children in Canada,’ we interrogated play in the historical and ongoing settler-colonial context of Canada by employing
Violence at the Intersections of Women’s Lives in an Urban Context
This article is based on an ethnographic study exploring Indigenous women's experiences of leaving intimate partner violence. Analysis draws attention to the contextual features of Indigenous women's lives that differentially shaped women's experiences of "leaving and/or staying" with an abusive partner. Our findings are identified and described across four intersecting thematic areas: (a) the context of state-Indigenous relations; (b) complex tr…
I tend to forget bad things
Distress among young immigrant and refugee men has drawn increasing research attention in recent years. Nuanced understandings of distress are needed to inform mental health and public health programming. The purpose of this research was to examine distress from the perspectives of young immigrant and refugee men living in Greater Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Thirty-three young men (aged 15-22 years) from diverse immigrant and refugee bac…
The RIPPLES of Meaningful Involvement
Indigenous Peoples experience the greatest health inequities in Canada and other colonized countries, yet are routinely excluded from health-related policy decisions. Those advocating for Indigenous health equity are often left wrestling with the question: What constitutes, and what can foster, meaningful involvement of Indigenous Peoples in the contemporary health policy climate? Twenty (n = 20) in-depth, open-ended interviews with Indigenous an…
Disruption as opportunity
This analysis suggests that organizations should anticipate and plan for various types of disruptions, while maximizing opportunities for ownership of the intervention by those within the organization. Our findings further suggest that equity-oriented interventions be paced for intense delivery over a relatively short time frame, be evaluated, particularly with data that can be made available on an ongoing basis, and explicitly include a harm red…
Relational approaches to fostering health equity for Indigenous children through early childhood intervention
This paper reports on key findings of a critical qualitative inquiry undertaken with an Indigenous early child development (ECD) program in Canada, known as the Aboriginal Infant Development Program (AIDP). In depth, semi-structured interviews were used to obtain the perspectives of: Indigenous caregivers and Elders, AIDP workers, and administrative leaders. The findings centre on: (1) a relational perspective of family wellbeing that emphasises …
Attending to power differentials
OBJECTIVE: In Canada, primary care reform has encouraged innovations, including nurse practitioners (NPs) and group medical visits (GMVs). NP-led GMVs provide an opportunity to examine barriers and enablers to implementing this innovation in primary care. DESIGN: An instrumental case study design (n=3): two cases where NPs were using GMVs and one case where NPs were not using GMVs, was completed. In-depth interviews with patients and providers (N…
Engaging Indigenous families in a community-based Indigenous early childhood programme in British Columbia, Canada
This article is part of a larger study that explored how an Indigenous early intervention programme in British Columbia (BC), Canada, known as the 'Aboriginal Infant Development Program' (AIDP), influenced family and children's health and well-being and was responsive to child health inequities. Postcolonial feminist and Indigenous feminist perspectives provided a critical analytical lens to this qualitative inquiry. The study was undertaken with…
Homelessness in female-headed families
OBJECTIVES: To identify risk and protective factors for family homelessness, a case-control study of homeless and low-income, never-homeless families, all female-headed, was conducted. METHODS: Homeless mothers (n = 220) were enrolled from family shelters in Worcester, Mass. Low-income housed mothers receiving welfare (n = 216) formed the comparison group. The women completed an interview covering socioeconomic, social support, victimization, men…
Clinical encounters between nurses and First Nations women in a Western Canadian hospital
Race’ matters
The major purpose of this paper is to examine how 'race' and racialization operate in health care. To do so, we draw upon data from an ethnographic study that examines the complex issues surrounding health care access for Aboriginal people in an urban center in Canada. In our analysis, we strategically locate our critical examination of racialization in the 'tension of difference' between two emerging themes, namely the health care rhetoric of 't…
Access to Primary Care From the Perspective of Aboriginal Patients at an Urban Emergency Department
In this article, we discuss findings from an ethnographic study in which we explored experiences of access to primary care services from the perspective of Aboriginal people seeking care at an emergency department (ED) located in a large Canadian city. Data were collected over 20 months of immersion in the ED, and included participant observation and in-depth interviews with 44 patients triaged as stable and nonurgent, most of whom were living in…
Beyond deficit
Health research concerning Indigenous peoples has been strongly characterised by deficit discourse-a 'mode of thinking' that is overly focused on risk behaviours and problems. Strengths-based approaches offer a different perspective by promoting a set of values that recognise the capacities and capabilities of Indigenous peoples. In this article, we seek to understand the conceptual basis of strengths-based approaches as currently presented in he…
Aboriginal citizen, discredited medical subject
The place of receptionists in access to primary care
Harms and benefits
Harm reduction, methadone maintenance treatment and the root causes of health and social inequities
Using our research findings, we explore Harm Reduction and Methadone Maintenance Treatment (MMT) using an intersectional lens to provide a more complex understanding of Harm Reduction and MMT, particularly how Harm Reduction and MMT are experienced differently by people dependent on how they are positioned. Using the lens of intersectionality, we refine the notion of Harm Reduction by specifying the conditions in which both harm and benefit arise…
Moving beyond description
Engaging Indigenous families in a community-based Indigenous early childhood programme in British Columbia, Canada
This article is part of a larger study that explored how an Indigenous early intervention programme in British Columbia (BC), Canada, known as the 'Aboriginal Infant Development Program' (AIDP), influenced family and children's health and well-being and was responsive to child health inequities. Postcolonial feminist and Indigenous feminist perspectives provided a critical analytical lens to this qualitative inquiry. The study was undertaken with…
Underclassism' and access to healthcare in urban centres
In this article, we draw on findings from an ethnographic study that explored experiences of healthcare access from the perspectives of Indigenous and non-Indigenous patients seeking services at the non-urgent division of an urban emergency department (ED) in Canada. Our aim is to critically examine the notion of 'underclassism' within the context of healthcare in urban centres. Specifically, we discuss some of the processes by which patients exp…
Relational approaches to fostering health equity for Indigenous children through early childhood intervention
This paper reports on key findings of a critical qualitative inquiry undertaken with an Indigenous early child development (ECD) program in Canada, known as the Aboriginal Infant Development Program (AIDP). In depth, semi-structured interviews were used to obtain the perspectives of: Indigenous caregivers and Elders, AIDP workers, and administrative leaders. The findings centre on: (1) a relational perspective of family wellbeing that emphasises …
Negotiating barriers, navigating the maze
This study documents the policy framework that shapes First Nations' experience of relocating to access medical care. We analyzed policy documents and government websites, interviewed individuals who have experienced relocation, family members, healthcare providers, health administrators, and conducted two focus groups with government representatives. Federal and provincial program managers interpret policies, make decisions on eligibility, to ex…
Struggling to Survive
The increasingly high rates of mortality and morbidity among Canadian Aboriginal women who are living with HIV/ AIDS indicate that there is a need to address deficiencies in the delivery of supportive services and health care. The purpose of this qualitative study was to develop a greater understanding of the barriers, challenges, and successes experienced when accessing health and related support services from the perspective of Aboriginal women…
Addressing anti-Indigenous racism in Canadian health systems
Violence at the Intersections of Women’s Lives in an Urban Context
This article is based on an ethnographic study exploring Indigenous women's experiences of leaving intimate partner violence. Analysis draws attention to the contextual features of Indigenous women's lives that differentially shaped women's experiences of "leaving and/or staying" with an abusive partner. Our findings are identified and described across four intersecting thematic areas: (a) the context of state-Indigenous relations; (b) complex tr…
Navigating Structural Violence with Indigenous Families
Internationally, the welfare of Indigenous children continues to be severely compromised by their involvement with child welfare authorities. In this context, there are calls for greater investment in early childhood programs to support family preservation and children’s well-being. This article reports on the findings from a critical qualitative inquiry undertaken with Aboriginal Infant Development Programs (AIDPs) in Canada. The findings highli…
A Critical Reframing of Play in Relation to Indigenous Children in Canada
In this paper, we explore the implications of applying critical perspectives to the play occupations of Indigenous children in Canada, and of reframing play as an occupational determinant of health. First we consider the normalizing construction of play in early child development. We then apply critical perspectives to discuss the implications of reframing play as an occupational determinant by exploring how Indigenous children's play can be shap…
Bringing an Equity Lens to Participant Observation in Critical Ethnographic Health Research
Critically-oriented health research often engages participants whose lives are shaped by structural inequities and structural violence. As scholars who engage in critical theoretical, praxis-oriented research, including research with social justice and decolonizing aims, we are cognizant of the histories of exploitation and structural violence often perpetuated through research. To engage in research that effectively promotes health equity, we ar…
Interrogating play as a strategy to foster child health equity and counteract racism and racialization
In our 2014 article, ‘A Critical Reframing of Play in Relation to Indigenous Children in Canada,’ we interrogated play in the historical and ongoing settler-colonial context of Canada by employing
I tend to forget bad things
Distress among young immigrant and refugee men has drawn increasing research attention in recent years. Nuanced understandings of distress are needed to inform mental health and public health programming. The purpose of this research was to examine distress from the perspectives of young immigrant and refugee men living in Greater Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Thirty-three young men (aged 15-22 years) from diverse immigrant and refugee bac…
Can ethnicity data collected at an organizational level be useful in addressing health and healthcare inequities
The quality of ethnicity data collected within healthcare organizations is often unreliable, particularly for people from racialized or visible minority groups, who are most at risk, seriously limiting the usefulness of the data. Quality measures for collecting data reflecting ethnocultural identity in specific healthcare organizations may be warranted - but only if mechanisms exist or are developed for linking ethnicity with measures of perceive…
Access to Health Care
The RIPPLES of Meaningful Involvement
Indigenous Peoples experience the greatest health inequities in Canada and other colonized countries, yet are routinely excluded from health-related policy decisions. Those advocating for Indigenous health equity are often left wrestling with the question: What constitutes, and what can foster, meaningful involvement of Indigenous Peoples in the contemporary health policy climate? Twenty (n = 20) in-depth, open-ended interviews with Indigenous an…
Homelessness in female-headed families
OBJECTIVES: To identify risk and protective factors for family homelessness, a case-control study of homeless and low-income, never-homeless families, all female-headed, was conducted. METHODS: Homeless mothers (n = 220) were enrolled from family shelters in Worcester, Mass. Low-income housed mothers receiving welfare (n = 216) formed the comparison group. The women completed an interview covering socioeconomic, social support, victimization, men…
First Nations Women’s Encounters with Mainstream Health Care Services
Health care encounters are important areas for study because they reflect social, political, economic, and ideological relations between patients and the dominant health care system. This study examines mainstream health care encounters from the viewpoint of First Nations women from a reserve community in northwestern Canada. Perspectives from critical medical anthropology and the concept of cultural safety provided the theoretical orientation fo…
Access to Health Care
Othering and Being Othered in the Context of Health Care Services
Othering is a process that identifies those that are thought to be different from oneself or the mainstream, and it can reinforce and reproduce positions of domination and subordination. Although there are theoretical and conceptual treatments of othering in the literature, researchers lack sufficient examples of othering practices that influence the interactions between patients and health care providers. The purpose of this study was to explore…
Aboriginal citizen, discredited medical subject
Clinical encounters between nurses and First Nations women in a Western Canadian hospital
Race’ matters
The major purpose of this paper is to examine how 'race' and racialization operate in health care. To do so, we draw upon data from an ethnographic study that examines the complex issues surrounding health care access for Aboriginal people in an urban center in Canada. In our analysis, we strategically locate our critical examination of racialization in the 'tension of difference' between two emerging themes, namely the health care rhetoric of 't…
Harms and benefits
Struggling to Survive
The increasingly high rates of mortality and morbidity among Canadian Aboriginal women who are living with HIV/ AIDS indicate that there is a need to address deficiencies in the delivery of supportive services and health care. The purpose of this qualitative study was to develop a greater understanding of the barriers, challenges, and successes experienced when accessing health and related support services from the perspective of Aboriginal women…
Enhancing measurement of primary health care indicators using an equity lens
The current emphasis on achieving greater equity through PHC, the continued calls for the renewal and strengthening of PHC, and the use of monitoring and performance indicators highlight the relevance of ensuring that there are more accurate methods to capture the complex work of PHC organizations
Harm reduction, methadone maintenance treatment and the root causes of health and social inequities
Using our research findings, we explore Harm Reduction and Methadone Maintenance Treatment (MMT) using an intersectional lens to provide a more complex understanding of Harm Reduction and MMT, particularly how Harm Reduction and MMT are experienced differently by people dependent on how they are positioned. Using the lens of intersectionality, we refine the notion of Harm Reduction by specifying the conditions in which both harm and benefit arise…
Access to Primary Care From the Perspective of Aboriginal Patients at an Urban Emergency Department
In this article, we discuss findings from an ethnographic study in which we explored experiences of access to primary care services from the perspective of Aboriginal people seeking care at an emergency department (ED) located in a large Canadian city. Data were collected over 20 months of immersion in the ED, and included participant observation and in-depth interviews with 44 patients triaged as stable and nonurgent, most of whom were living in…
Closing the health equity gap
These evidence- and theoretically-informed key dimensions and strategies provide direction for PHC organizations aiming to redress the increasing levels of health and health care inequities across population groups. The findings provide a framework for conceptualizing and operationalizing the essential elements of equity-oriented PHC services when working with marginalized populations, and will have broad application to a wide range of settings, …
Can ethnicity data collected at an organizational level be useful in addressing health and healthcare inequities
The quality of ethnicity data collected within healthcare organizations is often unreliable, particularly for people from racialized or visible minority groups, who are most at risk, seriously limiting the usefulness of the data. Quality measures for collecting data reflecting ethnocultural identity in specific healthcare organizations may be warranted - but only if mechanisms exist or are developed for linking ethnicity with measures of perceive…
A Critical Reframing of Play in Relation to Indigenous Children in Canada
In this paper, we explore the implications of applying critical perspectives to the play occupations of Indigenous children in Canada, and of reframing play as an occupational determinant of health. First we consider the normalizing construction of play in early child development. We then apply critical perspectives to discuss the implications of reframing play as an occupational determinant by exploring how Indigenous children's play can be shap…
Patient confidentiality within the context of group medical visits
BACKGROUND: Group medical visits (GMVs), clinical encounters with a medical component delivered to groups of patients, have emerged as an innovative approach to potentially increasing efficiency while enhancing the quality of primary health care (PHC). GMVs have created the need to pay explicit attention to patient confidentiality. OBJECTIVE: What strategies are used by providers and patients to address issues of confidentiality within GMVs? DESI…
Missing Pathways to Self-Governance
This article explores how current policy shifts in British Columbia, Canada highlight an important gap in Canadian self-government discussions to date. The analysis presented draws on insights gained from a larger study that explored the policy contexts influencing the evolving roles of two long-standing urban Aboriginal health centres in British Columbia. We apply a policy framework to analyze current discussions occurring in British Columbia an…
Equip Healthcare
The multiple case study design provides an ideal opportunity to study the contextual factors shaping the implementation, uptake and impact of our tailored intervention within diverse PHC settings. The EQUIP intervention illustrates the complexities involved in enhancing the PHC sector's capacity to provide equity-oriented care in real world clinical contexts
Negotiating barriers, navigating the maze
This study documents the policy framework that shapes First Nations' experience of relocating to access medical care. We analyzed policy documents and government websites, interviewed individuals who have experienced relocation, family members, healthcare providers, health administrators, and conducted two focus groups with government representatives. Federal and provincial program managers interpret policies, make decisions on eligibility, to ex…
The place of receptionists in access to primary care
Underclassism' and access to healthcare in urban centres
In this article, we draw on findings from an ethnographic study that explored experiences of healthcare access from the perspectives of Indigenous and non-Indigenous patients seeking services at the non-urgent division of an urban emergency department (ED) in Canada. Our aim is to critically examine the notion of 'underclassism' within the context of healthcare in urban centres. Specifically, we discuss some of the processes by which patients exp…
Enhancing health care equity with Indigenous populations
BACKGROUND: Structural violence shapes the health of Indigenous peoples globally, and is deeply embedded in history, individual and institutional racism, and inequitable social policies and practices. Many Indigenous communities have flourished, however, the impact of colonialism continues to have profound health effects for Indigenous peoples in Canada and internationally. Despite increasing evidence of health status inequities affecting Indigen…
Representations of Indigenous Peoples and Use of Pain Medication in Canadian News Media
Using media coverage of the withdrawal of OxyContin in Canada in 2011 and 2012 as an example, this article describes a systematic analysis of how news media depict First Nations peoples in Canada. Stark differences can be seen in how First Nations and non-First Nations individuals and communities are represented. In First Nations communities, problematic substance use is discussed without considering the context of pain management, broad generali…
Disrupting the Continuities Among Residential Schools, the Sixties Scoop, and Child Welfare
In Canada, it is estimated that 3 times as many Indigenous children are currently in the care of the state compared to when the residential schools’ populations were at their peak. It is imperative that action be taken. This article explores the continuities among residential schools, the Sixties Scoop, and child welfare in Canada today. In particular, we examine how colonial and neocolonial discourses operate through and justify these policies a…
Attending to power differentials
OBJECTIVE: In Canada, primary care reform has encouraged innovations, including nurse practitioners (NPs) and group medical visits (GMVs). NP-led GMVs provide an opportunity to examine barriers and enablers to implementing this innovation in primary care. DESIGN: An instrumental case study design (n=3): two cases where NPs were using GMVs and one case where NPs were not using GMVs, was completed. In-depth interviews with patients and providers (N…
Political science (37 works) · Sociology (35 works) · Medicine (34 works) · Psychology (27 works) · Health care (26 works) · Indigenous Health, Education, and Rights (26 works) · Nursing (25 works) · Gender Studies (19 works) · Indigenous (18 works) · Health equity (16 works)