Evidence of meeting #132 for Health in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was industry.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Laila Goodridge Conservative Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB
I appreciate that.
My next question is about diagnosing brain injuries. They are hard to diagnose for many people at the best of times, and they're really difficult to diagnose if you don't have words. In the case of little kids, how can a parent spot a brain injury, especially in children who perhaps don't have the ability to share because they don't have their speech yet?
Chief Executive Officer, Brain Injury Canada
That's a good question. Anything that's outside of their typical behaviour may be a sign: disruptive sleep, irritability, loss of appetite. There are more serious symptoms such as vomiting, but anything that is atypical of their normal behaviour can be an indication.
More severe brain injuries you are able to see on medical imaging, but we don't have a test at the moment to be able to diagnose concussion through medical imaging, so it is symptom-based. It's up to parents to see the signs, and we need wide-scale educational campaigns to get that information into the hands of parents so that they know what to look for.
Conservative
Laila Goodridge Conservative Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB
Okay. Really quickly, what should a parent look for?
Chief Executive Officer, Brain Injury Canada
They should look for abnormal behaviour. If a child has fallen, then maybe they're crying irrationally or not eating. There's a change from their normal behaviour.
The problem with concussion and brain injury is that if you've met one person with a brain injury, you've met one person. If you suspect that your child has a brain injury, then visit your physician. However, we need to get that information into people's hands more widely so that they know to look out for this.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Ms. McDonald.
Thank you, Mrs. Goodridge.
Next we have Ms. Sidhu, please, for five minutes.
October 10th, 2024 / 4:10 p.m.
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. MacGregor and Ms. McDonald, for being here with us, and thank you for the work you are doing for the community.
My first question is for Ms. McDonald.
I'm from Peel Region. In Peel Region, there are 3,000 emergency room visits and hospitalizations for neurotrauma every year.
What is the most effective way to bring those numbers down and prevent brain injuries before they happen? You talked about early intervention.
Chief Executive Officer, Brain Injury Canada
That's wide-scale prevention. Not every brain injury can be prevented, but let's prevent those that we can prevent,.
For sports injuries, we need really stringent concussion protocols. We have those, but we need to make sure that they're in the hands of everyone.
In mitigating the brain injuries that we can, as I said, car accidents are a huge contributor. Over the lifespan of children, as one of the MPs mentioned earlier, there is child abuse and there are sports injuries. For youth, it's also sports injuries. For adults, it's car accidents.
Seniors have the highest incidence of concussion at the moment. That's going to get worse as this population ages. We need fall prevention strategies. When a senior comes in with a broken hip or a stroke, we should be looking for a brain injury. That's not always noticed. The diagnosis may be in favour of a broken hip, and these seniors often have poorer health outcomes.
We need to prevent the brain injuries that we can and then effectively treat, over the long term, the brain injuries that do happen so that people do have better health outcomes and are able to live well after their brain injury.
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
Thank you.
My second question is for you, Ms. McDonald.
In 2018, the Ontario government passed Rowan's Law to improve concussion safety in sports. What do we know about its effectiveness so far? What lessons have we learned from it that can we implement on that side?
Chief Executive Officer, Brain Injury Canada
That's been an incredible program. Unfortunately, we had to lose Rowan to get to that point. Now all sports teams....
My son plays hockey, and we have to do the Rowan's Law concussion course. It's put some formality into youth sports. Coaches have to follow it. A program like this—maybe not Rowan's Law, but something like it—should be adopted in every province to ensure that all of those touchpoints, like teachers, coaches and parents, are familiar with the signs and symptoms, because we know we can't rely on youth.
We also need to follow the return-to-learn and return-to-play protocols. We also need to follow return to life. Sport is very important when you're in high school, but when you're 27 and living with the effects of multiple concussions, maybe that sport you were playing in high school isn't as important. We need to make sure that we're prioritizing brain health rather than the sport. Make it okay for kids to walk away from the sport they love and still feel okay about that.
Rowan's Law has done an exponential job of creating this awareness within this community and among these various stakeholders. We need more of that across Canada.
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
Thank you.
My next question is for Mr. MacGregor.
I know data is very important. As Ms. McDonald said, we need comprehensive data. I know you're working with the brain injury organization. You must talk to other organizations too. How are you getting the comprehensive data to make the best policy?
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
That's a great question.
Of course, good data is so important to back up all of our policy decisions at whatever level of government we're at. As Michelle and other witnesses have alluded to, in so many areas there is a lack of clear data. It may not even be of the same level or quality, depending on what region you're obtaining it from.
One centrepiece of this national strategy is creating guidelines to have in a national strategy that allow for good data collection. Then all of our researchers, all of the people who are involved in this field, and the people living with a brain injury and their immediate support networks will be getting good policy that's based on the best available evidence.
When we crafted this bill, I think data was top of mind for us. That's why you see reference to it in a lot of the sections in the bill.
Liberal
Liberal
Sonia Sidhu Liberal Brampton South, ON
I will pass. Thank you for working on the bill.
Today is World Mental Health Day. I think it's a good thing that we're all coming together on your bill.
Liberal
Bloc
Luc Thériault Bloc Montcalm, QC
My next question is for Ms. McDonald, who is extremely eloquent.
Bill C‑277provides the following:
(j) maintain, in collaboration with Brain Injury Canada, a national information website providing current facts [...]
How would you achieve that goal?
Bloc
Luc Thériault Bloc Montcalm, QC
What would your editorial policy be, and where would you get information from?
I also wonder why your organization was chosen instead of Health Canada. It's not that I particularly like Health Canada. I find that its sites are often very poorly designed.
How would you ensure relevant and accessible information? Do you already have a strategy in place?
Chief Executive Officer, Brain Injury Canada
We are members of the Canadian Traumatic Brain Injury Research Consortium and the Canadian Concussion Network. We work with the brain injury associations. Everything we do is evidence-based. We take that and we translate it to the people who need it.
That's part of the research that has to happen. We can do all this phenomenal research, but if it's not getting into the hands of people who need it or if it's not being translated into programs, then we have a problem. We work with stakeholders across Canada, other non-profits. We want to work with the provincial, territorial and federal governments to ensure that everything that needs to be pushed to the brain injury audience is done. We work with the clinical side, the research side, allied health, physiotherapists, occupational therapy, speech and language....
Bloc
Luc Thériault Bloc Montcalm, QC
You know that, when Health Canada officials call officials working for another level of government, a series of interventions have already been organized.
As an organization, you'll need to communicate with a provincial minister of health or ministry officials to ask them whether they have information to share with you, for example.
To ensure your approach is relevant and to meet the mandate set out in this bill, do you have anything to say about the development of your strategy?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Give a brief answer if you can. He used all his time to pose the question.
Chief Executive Officer, Brain Injury Canada
This has to be developed with all of those stakeholders. This has to be developed with provincial and territorial governments and with indigenous leaders. We're working with the Public Health Agency of Canada to get better numbers to tie incidents to prevalence—what's happening to people with brain injury. That's also why brain injury needs to be designated as a chronic condition. It's so that we have that data over the long term to help to create those decisions.
Very many stakeholders need to be involved to develop it in order to make sure it is relevant to the different communities in Canada, because a lot of areas, such as Atlantic Canada and the north, don't have a lot of services. We need to make sure we're bridging that gap.
Liberal