Indigenous Health Research In Canada

Historically, Indigenous health research in Canada has failed to engage Indigenous peoples and communities as primary stakeholders of research evidence. However, the tide is now turning with community engagement a key element of health research (Labonte, Polanyi, Muhajarine, McIntosh, & Williams, 2005). This process creates an intercultural space for social interactions and empowerment for both the researcher and participants. Community engagement should be explicit in the entire research continuum from development of research objectives to implementation, evaluation and knowledge translation, and it is an appropriate process of undergoing Indigenous health research. Again, it is challenging to change policies without appropriate community

Non-Indigenous researchers can be educated in Indigenous culture, traditions, and connection between the Indigenous arts, culture, heritage, land and sea but yet still fail to fully understand these connections as such they need to be culturally humble and listen to Indigenous peoples with their hearts because spirituality matter to them (Patten & Ryan, 2001). Thus, it is essential to be open minded about Indigenous people’s extensive knowledge systems which have often been ignored or dismissed as folklore and lacking any science base (Getty, 2010). Again, researchers need to contest the domains of western research in Indigenous communities and change the research dynamics to Indigenous peoples controlling their own knowledge systems and identity.
Nevertheless, it may be a challenge for non-Indigenous researchers to reconcile the two cultures and learning styles but relationship building through listening and dialogue enables researchers discover what really informs his or her thinking and behaviour (Patten & Ryan, 2001). Dialogue redresses non-Indigenous presumptions and unexamined prejudices while listening deeply accelerates learning while providing personal enrichment (Patten & Ryan,

Researchers often use various methods to triangulate findings by utilizing more than one method to study the same thing, to complement the findings by obtaining a broader understanding of the research problem, and to inform, initiate, and expand other studies (Hesse-Biber, 2010).
Mixed methods in Indigenous research invite different voices to participate in a dialogue that embraces all cultures and promotes the social validity of the research, since community participation will be present at the beginning of the research and in every phase of the research (Mertens, 2007). This can build relationships by promoting collective action and social change, driven by population needs, integrating knowledge systems, and engage in a decolonized research process (Chilisa & Tsheko,