Karen
Firus,
BA, MFA
Patient Facilitator/Educator
Community Partner
Karen Firus is a charismatic and empowering educator, public speaker, and advocate who has lived with ME/CFS for 42 years. Her background as an award-winning filmmaker, artist, and on-air television news journalist brings a special flair and unique POV to her presentations on chronic illness, interprofessional collaboration, and health care issues. Karen’s experience, personal insights, and passion as a health mentor and patient-educator/facilitator for workshops on collaborative decision-making for UBC Health students have inspired many. Karen is a master of the pep talk and believes anything is possible!
Presenting at the Nexus Summit:
In 2021, an accessible approach to enhancing patient/family involvement in interprofessional education was piloted at the University of British Columbia. Using an existing capstone interprofessional activity, patient perspectives were incorporated into a workshop on collaborative decision-making to prepare students to work in our province’s emerging team-based primary care networks. The approach was informed by the pioneering work of the Patient and Community Partnership for Education, a unit within UBC Health that brings the expertise of patients, caregivers, and people with lived experience…