Maternity Experiences Behind Bars: Exploring Incarcerated Indigenous Women’s Reproductive and Maternal-Child Health
Dr. Christine Wang, PGY2
Supervisors: Drs. Anne Niec, Fiona Kouyoumdjian, & Jennifer Leason
Due to ongoing systemic racism and oppression, socio-economic marginalization, and impacts of colonialism, Indigenous women account for half of the female population in Canadian federal prisons. My presentation will outline our mixed methods approach and scoping review search strategy seeking to identify policies, initiatives and best practices that meet sexual and reproductive rights of incarcerated Indigenous women in Canada, USA, New Zealand and Australia, along with their lived experiences surrounding maternal-child health.
Objectives:
- To discuss how a mixed methods approach with quantitative, qualitative and community-based participatory measures can be adopted to explore incarcerated Indigenous women’s sexual, reproductive, and maternal child experiences, needs, strengths and priorities as they relate to gender, wellness, and trauma
- To explore how we decolonize previous public health research through a trauma and violence informed lens to illuminate incarcerated women’s experiences related to their strength and resilience, culture and contexts surrounding social and moral determinants of health
macpedsrrt.ca 