By Somesh Saras
The weather app on the phone shows it’s -19 degrees Celsius outside.
The app also reminds you it feels like -27. You might want to take a day off and maybe stay home. After all, it is Valentine’s Day. A day to stay home, with a mug of hot chocolate and loved ones around you.
But then you work for CCIS. Clients have to be the priority.
You step out; you feel the weather app was probably undermining the chill.
Not the coldest day of the year yet. It is Calgary. The freezing Arctic air has fallen in love with the city.
Gergesh Hamde is one of the Health Navigators working in the Health & Wellness Program under the Resettlement & Integration Services Division of CCIS. Her job is to guide and assist in navigating the healthcare system for newly arrived clients, mostly Government Assisted Refugees. Health Navigators are assigned to empower our clients by accompanying them to medical appointments using public transport and educating them about how to go around in this city.
And like most things CCIS, they function as a ‘Swiss knife,’ combining multiple roles within one. They help clients navigate, they interpret, they observe, report and assess client progress in terms of self-reliance and independence, and also perform as health educators on odd days. To top it all, they might have to work during evenings and some weekends.
Health Navigators are assigned to the task, based on their language skills and availability, once our Health & Wellness team receives a request from the Refugee Clinic or the counsellors/intensive case workers working with the client. A day before the assignment, they call the clients reminding them and planning the meeting for the appointment.
“It is not easy for our clients to learn how to use a mobile app and navigate the city for health appointments, as they come from very different backgrounds,” Gergesh tells me as we drive to Marlborough C-Train Station to pick up our client, Daniel Semere Nuguse. Daniel, from Eritrea, came to Calgary on December 18, 2024. He stayed at Margaret Chisholm Resettlement Center till he moved out to his accommodation on February 7th.
Daniel has an appointment at Total Cardiology in Sunridge.
As Gergesh greets him at Marlborough C-Train Station, she gets busy teaching him how to download the Transit app on his phone. She takes time explaining him how to navigate through the app, to navigate around the city. She speaks Tigrinya, Daniel’s native language.
Once she is confident, we take the C-Train to another stop at Rundle Station. On the way, she keeps educating him about what to expect while going around public transportation in Calgary.
As we get down at Rundle station, we check our apps for the next step.
The bus appears to be delayed by a few minutes; we may not make it to the appointment on time.
Our phones tell us that if we walk for 31 minutes, we will reach the destination. The ultra deep-freeze wind blowing in your face tells you that the proposition should not be considered. Expectedly, this scribe is skeptical, but Gergesh is upbeat.
“We walk all the time. The other day I walked for 45 minutes in the cold.” she says, “Are you up to it?”
Her enthusiasm is infectious. Daniel is in his 20s. We decide to walk.
After 10 minutes, the walk seems less arduous.
Gergesh continues telling Daniel when to cross a road, what to look for while doing so, and how to use the ‘pedestrian push button’ at traffic lights.
We reach the diagnostics center just in time. Gergesh is busy again, translating between Daniel and the center’s staff. After waiting for a few minutes in the lobby, Daniel gets his check-up. During the wait, Gergesh keeps telling the newcomer about the importance of keeping his health card and other documents safe and handy.
The appointment lasts less than half an hour. After the appointment, we head to the nearby bus stand—a mere 10-minute walk this time. We take the same route back. Daniel has some shopping to do and is confident he will be fine on his own.
We bid goodbye to Daniel, and as we head back to the office, Gergesh says, “Helping the newcomers really gives me a lot of satisfaction. Some days I get very tired, as there can be multiple back-to-back client appointments. But I’m happy at the end of the day. It is worth working hard for them.”
Probably the clients are happy too that Health Navigators like Gergesh are there, handholding them, and making them feel welcome in a city that is their new home!
