Sara Wolfe (born 1973) is an Anishnawbe registered nurse, registered midwife and founding partner o
Seventh Generation MidwivesToronto, which is a group of midwives who offer maternity care to women, particularly those from Toronto's downtown area and from the Indigenous community. Wolfe was a co-lead on the midwifery-led and Indigenous-governe
Toronto Birth Centre Wolfe is
Anishnawbe (
Ojibway
The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains.
According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of ...
) with family ties to
Brunswick House First Nation
Brunswick House First Nation is an Ojibway-Cree First Nations in the Canadian province of Ontario, located in the Sudbury District, northeast of Sault Ste Marie, Ontario. The First Nation have reserved for themselves the Mountbatten 76A Indian Re ...
,
Nishnawbe Aski Nation
Nishnawbe Aski Nation (ᐊᓂᐦᔑᓈᐯ ᐊᔅᑭ ᐃᔥᑯᓂᑲᓇᓐ ᐅᑭᒫᐎᓐ (''Anishinaabe-aski Ishkoniganan Ogimaawin''), unpointed: ᐊᓂᔑᓇᐯ ᐊᔅᑭ ᐃᔥᑯᓂᐊᓇᓐ ᐅᑭᒪᐎᓐ; NAN for short) is a political orga ...
.
Career
From 1999-2003 Wolfe was an Outpost Nurse in
Sioux Lookout
Sioux Lookout is a town in Northwestern Ontario, Canada. Located approximately northwest of Thunder Bay, it has a population of 5,272 people (up 4.7% since 2011), an elevation of , and its boundaries cover an area of , of which is lake and wetla ...
and
Moose Factory
Moose Factory is a community in the Cochrane District, Ontario, Canada. It is located on Moose Factory Island, near the mouth of the Moose River, which is at the southern end of James Bay. It was the first English-speaking settlement in lands n ...
.
Wolfe, with fellow Aboriginal midwifery students
Cheryllee Bourgeois and Ellen Blais, started the Toronto Aboriginal Midwives Initiative in 2002, and held community meetings and consultations to determine what the Native community wanted and needed.
She worked as a midwife for th
Midwives Collective Torontofrom 2003–2005. She was Head Midwife in the Dept. of Obstetrics and Gynaecology at
Sunnybrook Women's College Hospital from 2005 to January 2012. From November 2012 to December 2013 she was Interim Executive Director and Midwife Project Co-Lead at the Toronto Birth Centre Inc. The Toronto Birth Centre provides pre-natal classes, labour, birth and postpartum care, complimentary breast-feeding support, massage therapy and nutritional counselling.
In collaboration with St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto, Wolfe and Seventh Generation Midwives took on a three year research project to address infant mortality and child removal rates that are higher in Indigenous communities compared to the general population in Canada. Called The Baby Bundle Project, the goal of the research was to improve services for Indigenous families.
While identifying barriers to access, the research also worked to identify and provide for mothers' needs, such as midwifery, housing, counselling, or culturally specific traditions.
Wolfe co-led a four year research project about Indigenous people in Toronto that identified undercounting by
Statistics Canada.
In 2020, the Indigenous Innovation Initiative, of which Sara Wolfe is the director, was launched. The goal is to promote Indigenous economic participation and innovation
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References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wolfe, Sara
Anishinaabe people
Canadian midwives
1973 births
Living people