Grant: Project Grant

Peers4Wellness is an Indigenous research study, which is peer-led and community-driven. It is focused on Indigenous women (cis-and trans-gendered) who have lived experience with HIV and/or hepatitis C (HCV). Our goal is to help these women with their HIV/HCV wellness and health care needs by developing Indigenous-grounded supportive care. In Canada, the rates of HIV and HCV, respectively, are 3 and 5 times higher among Indigenous people, and Indigenous women in particular, than non-Indigenous people. Yet, Indigenous people have lower HIV/HCV health care utilization than non-Indigenous people. This pattern is a result of the barriers which Indigenous people experience when accessing HIV/HCV care, including the lack of Indigenous ways of wellness and health care. Peer navigation programs, which train peers as support health workers, are shown to help people with their health and getting health care. These programs are not widely used for HIV and are almost lacking for HCV. Importantly, existing peer navigation programs do not have systematic, explicit and robust approaches to address the unique needs of Indigenous people. Because peer navigation is a promising approach to better health care, this study is focused on extending the scope of research and practice on peer navigation to include HCV and Indigenous people, particularly Indigenous women. This study will develop a wise practice peer navigation toolkit for providing culturally safe and responsive supportive care to improve the engagement and retention of Indigenous people in HIV/HCV care. Peer navigation will serve as a springboard to further develop Indigenous models for supportive HIV/HCV care. This study's current focus is Indigenous women in two priority provinces: British Columbia and Saskatchewan. The model will be gender and context adaptable. We expect that the implementation of this innovative model will improve HIV/HCV outcomes for Indigenous people in Canada, and Indigenous women in particular.