St. Bartholomew’s Hospital By John Graham-Pole, MBBS, MD I wrap my skimpy white coat about me, shivering under the January snowfall as I cross Barts Square heading for the Med-Surg block. Whose idea was it for doctors to don white coats in January, anyway? Is it to give us an air of spotless sterility? Hardly […]
by Dorothy A. Lander We are Trees When the forest breathes out, you breathe in. When the forests thrive, you thrive. When the forest lives, you live. – Suzanne Simard, 2026 In May 2026, The Halifax Examiner reported on Suzanne Simard’s visit to Nova Scotia to launch her book When the Forest Breathes. It reminded […]
By Dorothy Lander In recent years, May Day, traditionally a celebration of Flora (the Roman Goddess of Spring and Flowers), has been overshadowed as a holiday to commemorate the historic struggles and gains made by workers and the labour movement. International Workers’ Day is observed on May 1 in many countries and as Labour Day […]
by John Graham-Pole Wellcome Collection Gallery: https://wellcomeimages.org/indexplus/image/V0028932.html It’s the very first day of January 1967. My first internal medicine internship begins this frosty Monday morning under the shades of St. Paul’s Cathedral in the city of London. Right now it’s 7:46 AM and I’m making my familiar way from the medical college across West Smithfield […]
By Dorothy Lander In a recent posting on LinkedIn, Tye Farrow introduced his doctoral research and the concept of Architectural Determinants of Health (AD0H) as the health-causing features and patterns of placemaking that translate and extend social, structural, and environmental determinants, showing how purposeful design choices become practical levers to support health and wellbeing. In […]
www.tryhealingarts.ca H-ealing A-rts R-econciling P-eoples March 8, 2026 Happy International Women’s Day, Honourable Michelle Thompson & Honourable Tim Houston: I write on behalf of HARP The People’s Press (www.tryhealingarts.ca), Nova Scotia’s independent multi-media publishing house and shareholder-owned Community Interest Company, dedicated to the healing arts for health equity. After the huge rallies across Nova Scotia […]
Follow the Money. A commitment to truth and justice marks the resistance of the less powerful against the exercise of institutional power. Again and again, that resistance collides with a familiar quid pro quo: the inscription of billionaire donors’ names on our most beloved cultural and educational institutions, and their influence on policy. Sackler at […]
by Dorothy Agnes Lander For the past 25 years, I (Dorothy Agnes Lander) have been writing letters to Letitia Youmans (1822-1896), foremother in the Canadian Sunday School movement, which peaked in the 19th century continuing well into the 20th century. My letters all begin “Dear Letitia” and close with the sign off “Your sister in […]
WATER IS LIFE A Settler Child Celebrates the Legal Personhood of Pemadeshkodeyong/Rice Lake by Dorothy Lander A landmark announcement during the “Giving Rights to Nature to Strengthen Climate Action” COP30[1] event at the Canada Pavilion on November 21, 2025 in Belem, Brazil on the doorstep of the Amazon, transported me to my childhood home in […]
By John Graham-Pole For more than three decades, the University of Florida’s Arts in Medicine program (AIM: artsinmedicine.ufhealth.org) has brought visual, literary, and performance artists into the hospital’s wards and clinics. Its mission has been simply to enrich the experience of patients and caregivers through countless forms of creative expression. When my nurse colleague […]
