Engaging With Communities to Foster Health: The Experience of Inner-City Children and Families With Learning Circles

Abstract

The authors briefly introduce a clinical outreach initiative that is innovative because of the types of partnerships that have been formed within an inner-city community context. The initiative was designed to foster access to primary health care and specialized services for children and families who are vulnerable because of their social and material circumstances. Through ongoing engagement and dialogue, the clinicians and the community have developed a number of points of engagement with the children and families. The authors use the case of Learning Circles to describe ways in which Indigenous knowledge and ways of being influenced the approaches taken to working with children and families. They reflect upon the ways in which this approach influenced community engagement and consider its potential for achieving health equity.