Book Review
Aboriginal Health in Canada: Historical, Cultural, and Epidemiological Perspectives (2nd edition)
James B Waldram, D Ann Herring and T Kue Young
ISBN: 978-0-802085-79-5; 2006; 352 pages; University of Toronto Press;
Shirley Woods
Nurse Epidemiologist, Northern Inter-Tribal Health Authority, Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, Canada
Arlene Kent-Wilkinson
Assistant Professor, College of Nursing, University of Saskatchewan, Canada
This is a comprehensive, indispensable book for Canadian graduate and undergraduate students and for all those interested in Aboriginal health issues in Canada. This new edition includes all the historical detail from the 1995 edition, plus an account of the plethora of Aboriginal health research, government reports, and public policy in the last decade. The determinant of health model which includes the holistic model and the medicine wheel is more clearly explained. Added emphasis has been put on health determinants, health indicators and health status. Loose terms such as 'healing' are clarified, and the term 'Aboriginal healing' replaces 'Aboriginal medicine' to be more politically correct. Throughout the book a tighter overview is provided after each chapter.
Noticeable gaps in this second edition are the following: the high incarceration rates of Aboriginals and the resulting health effects on individuals, families and communities; family systems and the role of elders in health; Indian slavery and its place in Canadian history; fetal alcohol syndrome disorder (FASD); and, a more detailed analysis of the levels of transfer across the country and its impact on First Nations health.
It is difficult to do justice to the proliferation of information on Aboriginal health that has ensued since the first edition. However, the authors have mentioned many of the key events. For future editions, rather than updates to existing chapters, the authors may want to consider updates by timeframes or periods of years, for example, 1990-2000, and 2000-2010 to fully capture the explosion of information in Aboriginal health care that is now occurring culturally and politically in Canada. The inclusion of a glossary and a chronological timeline, including specific topics of Treaties, Laws and Acts, and government reports may be a consideration for a third edition.
The authors, Waldram, Herring and Young are as synonymous to the Aboriginal health field in Canada, as Simone MacLeod is to the Aboriginal arts. MacLeod's 2002, colour illustration on the cover: Prayers for health, together with the authors' respect for and account of the diversity of Aboriginal people's health in Canada, past and present, make for a powerful combination.
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