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Introducing the AVA Women’s & Girls’ Health Hub: A Beacon for Equitable Care
The Alliance against Violence and Adversity (AVA) Women’s Health Hub is our latest endeavor, aimed at mobilizing and scaling up knowledge and models of practice to revolutionize healthcare for girls, women, and gender-diverse people (GWGDP) affected by violence and adversity. We recognize the urgent need for more equitable, culturally safe, and holistic health care, as well as improved access to care for this vulnerable population.
Health and social services agencies catering to GWGDP at-risk/affected by adversity and family violence, including gender-based violence, are in critical need of support to better implement effective models of care. Without such support, adverse childhood experiences remain unaddressed, and rates of family and gender-based violence continue to rise, exacerbating health outcomes.
Lead investigator involved
Nicole Letourneau, PhD RN FCAHS FAAN FCAN FRSC, is Professor in the Faculty of Nursing and Cumming School of Medicine, University of Calgary where she holds the Research Excellence Chair in Parent and Child Health. She is Scientific Director of the Alliance against Violence and Adversity (AVA) Health Research Training Platform and Women’s and Girls’ Health Hub, funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). She is Principal Investigator of the Child Health Implementation and Longitudinal Development (CHILD) Studies Program, examining parenting, genetics, and child mental health/development in the context of maternal depression, family violence and other stressors.
She is the creator of the Attachment and Child Health (ATTACH™) Parenting Program, now scaling in Canada, Denmark, and Brazil and leads the APrON cohort study of more than 2000 youth followed since prenatal life. As Principal Investigator, she currently holds more than $6 million in CIHR funding and has attained $80 million research funding over her career. She has published 280+ peer-reviewed papers and three books including Scientific Parenting: What Science Reveals About Parental Influence (2013) and What Kind of Parent Am I? (2018), both published by Dundurn.
What is the ‘origin story’ of your professional interest in this topic?
This project extends the work of the Alliance of Canadian Research Centres on Gender-Based Violence. These centres were established in response to the Montreal Massacre on December 6, 1989, when the Canadian government made a commitment to support research and education on violence against women and children. Seven sister centres were established in Atlantic Canada (New Brunwick), Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia as centres of excellence on violence against women and gender-based violence. The Alliance against Violence and Adversity (AVA) grew from this legacy and focuses on training the next generation of scholars in gender-based violence and early childhood adversity, community-engaged research, and implementation science methods. AVA is a collaboration between university and community partner organizations focused on innovation, improving services, and sharing and mobilizing knowledge to support health over the lifespan for girls, women, girls, and gender-diverse people affected by violence and adversity.
What do you wish people knew about the topic you are working on?
In 2023, the Federal government described gender-based violence as “an epidemic”. The Province of Ontario followed suit and made the declaration of an epidemic official. Since 2018, one girl or woman has been killed approximately every two days in Canada and nearly 80% of the 1,223 family violence victims between 2009 and 2022 were girls or women. Gender-based violence has grown substantially worse over the past decade. The community healthcare agencies that are increasingly relied upon to provide community healthcare to girls, women, and gender-diverse people vulnerable to such violence are typically privately owned and operated, non-governmental, not-for-profit organizations. Typically underfunded, they require urgent assistance to ensure that the supports and services they deliver are effective. AVA is working to enhance capacity of these ‘3rd sector’ community healthcare agency partners to deliver quality care to improve health outcomes for girls, women, and gender-diverse people at-risk or affected by gender-based violence.
How would you describe the objective(s) of your Hub in the simplest terms?
- Convene regional and national knowledge mobilization meetings in both official languages.
- Engage in community-based priority-setting activities at regional meetings.
- Establish and Support Indigenous Women’s and Girls’ Health Hubs.
- Create and share inventory of evidence-based programs/interventions for diverse groups of girls, women, and gender-diverse people.
- Widespread and frequent integrated knowledge translation (iKT).
- Foster scale-up of newly generated and existing knowledge and models of practice (e.g. programs, interventions).
- Plan for sustainability.
- High-quality governance.
What would look different if your Hub has the impact you envision? What changes and how?
If our Hub achieves the impact we envision, there would be a significant transformation in healthcare, characterized by equitable, evidence-based, gender-sensitive, and culturally safe practices that address the needs of diverse women, girls, and gender-diverse people. Our team, including the GWGDP Engagement Committee, would embody a wide range of perspectives and lived experiences, ensuring that all voices are heard and represented. This diversity would span across various dimensions, such as race, ethnicity, religion, immigration status, ability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, and age. As a result, healthcare would become more inclusive, accessible, and holistic for all, leading to better health outcomes and improved quality of life for these communities.
How might being a part of a coalition like this one strengthen your work and impact?
Being part of a coalition like CanWaCH would significantly strengthen our work and amplify our impact by facilitating the dissemination of knowledge through our extended network of partners. Collaboration within a diverse alliance allows us to tap into a wide range of expertise, experiences, and resources that enrich our approach to addressing the complex challenges faced by women, girls, and gender-diverse people.
With additional partners, we can reach broader and more varied audiences, ensuring that critical information, best practices, and innovative solutions are shared more widely and effectively. This expanded reach enhances the visibility of our work and fosters greater community engagement and empowerment. By leveraging each partner’s unique strengths and perspectives, we can co-create and distribute culturally relevant, evidence-based knowledge that is more likely to resonate with different communities and drive meaningful change.
The coalition’s collaborative environment encourages cross-sector learning and the development of new strategies that can be adapted and scaled across various contexts. This collective effort ultimately strengthens our capacity to advocate for and implement systemic changes that promote more equitable, inclusive, and holistic healthcare solutions, benefiting those we aim to serve.
Webinar Wednesdays
Join the AVA Women’s and Girls Health Hub every week for Webinar Wednesdays, a dynamic series spotlighting the health, safety, and well-being of women and girls across diverse communities. Our sessions dive deep into critical issues such as gender-based violence, health equity, trauma-informed care, and the social determinants of health that uniquely impact women and girls throughout their lives.
Each webinar brings together leading researchers, frontline practitioners, and community advocates who are driving meaningful change in the fields of public health, mental health, and gender justice. Together, we explore evidence-based strategies and community-rooted solutions that promote resilience, empowerment, and equitable access to care for women and girls.
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Whether you’re a service provider, researcher, advocate, or community member, these engaging sessions offer valuable knowledge and practical tools to advance health equity, prevent violence, and champion the rights and wellness of women and girls.
📅 Check out our website for a list of upcoming topics and speakers or FOLLOW US on social media. Links to our channels are shared below.
Connect on social media
Check out our hashtags: #AVAtraining, #AVAprogram, #AVA
Learn more about the Hub’s work or join AVA for free
Join AVA: To help transform the health for those affected by violence and adversity
AVA is not only a Women’s & Girls’ Health Hub, AVA is also building a bold, national movement to transform community health and social services for girls, women, and gender-diverse people across the lifespan. Launched in 2022 as a CIHR-funded Health Research Training Platform, AVA has since expanded into a dynamic Knowledge Mobilization Hub in 2023 and an Implementation Science Research Program in 2024.
Join over 350 partners who are already working with AVA to create a real, lasting impact. Be part of an innovative, evidence-based effort to promote equity, wellness, and resilience for those affected by violence and adversity. Gain free access to AVA’s Online Training Platform and connect with a growing network of national and international collaborators.
Working together to make things better!
AVA Women’s & Girls’ Health Hub
Marlyn Bennett – Indigenous Women’s & Girls’ Health Hub
Malcolm King – Indigenous Women’s & Girls’ Health Hub
Media coverage
HERhealth Podcast: Transforming Health for Women & Girls at Risk
Contact information
Reach us by contacting [email protected].
