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Events

CANAC Awards of Excellence

In addition to our Annual Conference, CANAC hosts local and regional educational events. Check here for a number of CANAC activities and events in your region.

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Toronto Educational Event – May 26, 2023

 

Agenda coming soon. Lunch provided. Registration required.

Click the link below to register.

Ontario CANAC members can also apply for travel scholarships within Ontario. The scholarship application deadline is April 15, 2023.

To join CANAC as a member visit our Membership page today!

Join your colleagues from across Ontario to sample clinical and community updates for the HIV community with a special focus on newcomers with limited health insurance.

CANAC will host our AGM and Award Ceremony as part of this event. For more information on our Awards of Excellence or to nominate a CANAC member for outstanding work in HIV, visit Awards of Excellence.

For this in-person event, we encourage participants to take precautions against the spread of COVID-19: do not attend if you are ill, wear masks when at the event and practice hand hygiene. For information about COVID-19 in Toronto, visit Toronto Public Health COVID-19 Information.

 

Presented in partnership with the Blue Door Clinic:

Online Event – February 23, 2023: Angels on Call Documentary

Street nurses Evanna Brennan, 75, and Susan Giles, 68, have foregone retirement to provide fulltime care to the desperately ill, homeless, alcoholic and drug addicted residents of Vancouver’s poverty-stricken Downtown Eastside. Directed and produced by Roberta Staley. Co-directed and co-produced by Tallulah. Funded by Telus StoryHive.

 

Biographies
Susan Giles, RN

Susan Giles RN, is a native of Vancouver, BC. From 1990-2012 she teamed up with colleague Evanna Brennan to deliver Home Care Nursing services to a population of marginalized people struggling with drug addiction and HIV/AIDS. Following retirement from Vancouver Coastal Health in 2012, she and Evanna started ABC Nursing Consultants. They have worked part time and full time contracts with Lookout Housing and Health Society from 2012-2023. Susan is a member of the Canadian Association of Nurses in AIDS Care. In 1999 she was co-recipient (with Evanna Brennan) of CANAC’s Jill Sullivan Award of Excellence in HIV/AIDS Nursing. In 2003 she was co-recipient (with Evanna Brennan) of BC Persons with AIDS Society AccolAIDS Award for Health Promotion and Harm Reduction. In 2009 she was co-recipient (with Evanna Brennan) of the Award of Distinction in Nursing from the College of Registered Nurses of BC.

Evanna Brennan, RN
A native of County Dublin, Ireland, Evanna Brennan, RN, took her training in Temple Street Children’s Hospital, Dublin & St. Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin. She has worked as a Home Care Nurse with her teammate Susan Giles from 1990-2012 and they have addressed the needs of the residents of the challenging area of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. In 1997 Evanna was chosen as one of thirty-three nurses across Canada for the Canadian HIV/AIDS Nursing Mentorship program funded by Health Canada. In this role she educated and supported nurses from across the country who were grappling with the complexities of caring for an increasingly multi-diagnosed (IVDU, HIV/AIDS, mental illness) population. She is a long-standing member of the Canadian Association of Nurses in AIDS Care. In 1999 she was co-recipient (with Susan Giles) of CANAC’s Jill Sullivan Award of Excellence in HIV/AIDS Nursing. In 2003 she was co-recipient (with Susan Giles) of BC Persons with AIDS Society AccolAIDS award for Health Promotion and Harm Reduction. In 2009 she was co-recipient (with Susan Giles) of the Award of Excellence in Nursing from the College of Registered Nurses of BC. In the mid 1990s, as the HIV epidemic began in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, Susan and Evanna began receiving referrals to provide Home Care Nursing services to a chaotic, street involved clientele living and dying with HIV/AIDS. They consulted and collaborated with inner city nurses in San Francisco, Amsterdam and Montreal. Combined with gritty field experience, they developed a model “Action Based Care” that defines principles and approaches to providing effective, ethical nursing care to such a population with a goal of removing barriers to care. They have field-taught student nurses from Vancouver Nursing Schools; community health nurses from across Canada and HIV nurse clinicians from Japan. They have shared their Action Based Care approach and experiences locally, nationally and internationally at conferences and seminars.