Dr. Holly Graham never planned on nursing. She wanted a police badge, then a law degree and a judge's bench.

Instead, she followed her mother's wish and walked into nursing school as the only student from a reserve in a class of more than 200. The isolation was real. So were the health gaps she saw every shift.

In this episode, Graham traces her path from being the only Cree nurse in her graduating class, to becoming a professor of psychiatry, registered doctoral psychologist, and Indigenous Research Chair in Nursing at the University of Saskatchewan. Her curiosity about widespread health disparities for Indigenous people pushed her back to university, into a master's degree and a PhD focused on Indigenous health. She continues to provide mental health counselling for patients carrying deep-seated trauma and symptoms of PTSD.

She also explains why watching Grey's Anatomy during the pandemic inspired her to create a free pocket-sized 'CPR Racism' guide.

"CPR underscores the urgency of life," said Graham. "People are unfortunately not having the best health outcomes, and in some situations dying as a result of racism."

From that insight, Graham created a free CPR RACISM Guide that was mailed to every nurse in Saskatchewan. The goal is to name harmful behaviours, protect patients, and support colleagues without slapping labels on anyone. Along with founding a Professional Practice Group for Indigenous nurses and nursing students, she's found ways to turn loneliness and unanswered questions into mentorship networks, national training guidelines, and real-life tools that reshape the way nurses see their patients and themselves.

"Health really is wealth," she said. "If we want to address health disparities, we need a representative workforce and a culture of caring that doesn't repeat past harms."

Most childhoods don't involve sitting at the hospital for an infusion of medication, transfusions on weekends, or worrying that classmates will comment on the colour of your skin.

For one Saskatoon teen with an ultra-rare blood disease, that's everyday life. She was diagnosed with a form of anemia so uncommon only a handful of cases have been identified globally.

In this episode, Sarah Tehseen (MD) & Katie Felton (MD) share how they're working to change her "normal" by opening a phase 3 pharmaceutical trial and fighting for a better quality of life.

We hear how Tehseen and Felton each got into medicine, why they love working with kids, and what it's like to be there for families on "one of the worst days of their life."

"It's getting them through the next day, week, month and years ahead," said Felton. "So even though, yeah, I deal with blood disorders and cancer, which are really can be difficult conversations with families, we still have fun."

They pull back the curtain on the effort it took to bring a this drug trial for an ultra-rare form of anemia to Jim Pattison Children's Hospital. From having to respond to 40 or 50 e-mails a day, to forfeiting vacation time as their patient goes through blood draws and clinic visits, it's a heavy lift.

"Definitely, it requires some changing and plans for us at times, to be able to accommodate and facilitate that," said Tehseen. "Having two physicians doing it together, rather than being doing it alone, is has, has been super helpful."

They discuss the hidden financial realities of rare drugs, and the importance of blood and stem cell donation.

Both physicians say they find true joy in detective work, and in finding the right treatments for their patients. And even simple things like learning a child's favourite video game or doing bunny-hop races down the hall can help kids coping with rare diseases feel a little less alone.

Tehseen says it's worth learning more.

"If she's your classmate, if she's your student, know what it is, how it's affecting her. Because the more you know, the better you're able to show up in the life of that person," she said.

OneMatch Bone Marrow Registry - https://www.blood.ca/en/hospital-donors-and-volunteers/become-donor/one-match

Canadian Blood Services - https://www.blood.ca/en

Peter Hedlin (PhD, MD) recalls being a 'young, naïve medical student' when he asked a mentor a question that's stuck with him for years.

"I remember asking how anaesthetics work on the brain," said Hedlin. "And he said, 'we actually don't really know'. And I thought that was crazy."

Today, Hedlin is an anesthesiologist and clinician scientist at the University of Saskatchewan's College of Medicine. He examines what surgery and sedation do to the human body — in particular, to aging brains.

Trained first as a microbiologist who earned his PhD as a vaccine researcher at VIDO (Vaccine and Infections Disease Organization), Hedlin was always drawn to medicine. He gravitated toward helping patients one-on-one, and loved the immediate feedback of operating‑room decisions.

"I love to see immediate consequences of actions and anesthesia's perfect for that," he said. "Some people hate being in hospitals, but I love it."

In this episode, Hedlin unpacks post‑operative delirium: the "loopiness" many people feel a day or two after surgery. Most of the grogginess eventually wears off, but for those over age 60, it can persist.

In older adults, cognitive dysfunction may appear as visible agitation, as patients hallucinate or pull out intravenous lines following surgery. Conversely, it can be easier to miss when patients enter a quieter, hypoactive state, withdrawing and not talking as much.

That 'acute brain failure' can last weeks, months, even years. It's linked to longer hospital stays, higher short‑term mortality and a greater chance of ending up in long‑term care.

"We don't have a great understanding why that happens," said Hedlin. "I'd love to make care for our elderly patients better, and we know cognitive dysfunction in the surgical period is common."

Hedlin says that work begins before long the patient's surgery date. Along with nursing managers, psychiatric and geriatric specialists, he's piloting a screening tool to assess older patients for frailty and cognitive risk. He asks patients to bring along a friend or a family member, who knows their baseline, to assist with daily delirium checks before and after the operation.

"When we can identify these patients several weeks before their surgery, then it gives potentially an opportunity to intervene and optimise that patient prior to their their surgical event," he said.

Hedlin is also participating in larger, randomized studies, and is watching developments in other parts of the country with interest.

But Hedlin also points to simple fixes hospital staff can make, such as returning patients' hearing aids and glasses, and ensuring older patients get a good night's sleep after surgery.

"Just returning people to as normal a situation as possible is really quite helpful for reorienting them in that post-operative period," he said.