The Health and Justice Alliance online sessions facilitate a dialogue between doctors and lawyers around high-conflict separation

May 17, 2022

For the ultimate benefit of BC families who are experiencing toxic stress from high-conflict parental separation and divorce, doctors and lawyers have joined forces and are offering two online sessions to support families and find solutions. With an overarching theme of ‘working together for families,’ the goals of this collaborative venture are to break down the silos and allow physicians and lawyers together to explore the experiences of our patients/clients going through high conflict separation and divorce and to act as a bridging opportunity – after all, doctors’ patients are also lawyers’ clients, and vice versa.

The first of two online sessions kicked off May 18th with more than 100 attendees of mostly doctors and lawyers. This unique event was hosted by Dr Ramneek Dosanjh, President of Doctors of BC, and Lisa Hamilton, QC, President of the Law Society of BC, who both share a passion for their patients and clients and the well-being of families. Jane Morley, QC, from Access to Justice BC, gave an opening address to welcome attendees.

In this first session, doctors and lawyers shared their observations, heard each other’s perspectives, and explored the patient/client experience. As it was meant to be a dialogue and not a webinar, there were several small group breakout sessions, and the event ended with a Presidents’ fireside chat – where they each shared moving stories and reminded the audience that doctors and lawyers choose their respective professions because they want to make a difference in the lives of their patients and clients. As the training for doctors and lawyers is not always trauma informed, it was important for these sessions to create a safe space for the dialogue. The group also learned about Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), of which separation and divorce is one.

’Start with ourselves’ is the theme of the second session, taking place June 14, and has been developed to allow attendees to become more aware of the impact on the professionals who deal with toxic situations, and to explore how best to serve our patient/clients.

If you’re interested in attending the session on June 14th, please register here. These online events are co-hosted by the Law Society of BC, Access to Justice BC, and Doctors of BC. The vision is to create a family justice system that best supports children, youth, and families.

 

ACCREDITATION/CERTIFICATION STATEMENT

The University of British Columbia Division of Continuing Professional Development (UBC CPD) is fully accredited by the Committee on Accreditation of Continuing Medical Education (CACME) to provide study credits for continuing medical education for physicians. This event is an Accredited Group Learning Activity (Section 1) as defined by the Maintenance of Certification Program of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada and has been approved by UBC CPD for up to 11.0 MOC Section 1 Group Learning credits. This program meets the certification criteria of the College of Family Physicians of Canada and has been certified by UBC CPD for up to 11.0 Mainpro+ Group Learning credits. Each physician should claim only those credits accrued through participation in the activity.
CFPC Session ID: 197354-001
  
This program was co-developed between Shared Care Committee, The Law Society of BC and Access to Justice BC and was planned to achieve scientific integrity, objectivity and balance.