Biography:

 

Dr. Brittany Barker is a health services and population health researcher whose program of research focuses on improving health systems for women, birthing people, and families affected by substance use, with particular attention to perinatal health, equity, and culturally safe models of care. Her work integrates mixed-methods research, implementation science, and community-engaged approaches to examine how policies, programs, and service environments shape access to care, continuity, and health outcomes across the reproductive life course.

As the inaugural postdoctoral fellow, and subsequently, the first Scientist at the First Nations Health Authority (FNHA), Dr. Barker has co-led provincial research and evaluation initiatives addressing perinatal substance use and prescribed safer supply in partnership with university researchers, Indigenous health leadership, clinicians, and people with lived and living experience. Her research is grounded in Indigenous health research principles, relational accountability, and decolonial approaches that centre First Nations perspectives on wellness, healing, and self-determination. A central focus of her work is advancing evidence to support First Nations life givers who use substances through trauma-informed, relationship-based, and wholistic models of care, including efforts to bring birthing services closer to home.

Dr. Barker is the Nominated Principal Investigator of the CIHR-funded SUPPORT Project (Evaluating Substance Use Perinatal Programs to Optimize Resources and Treatment), a provincial partnership with the First Nations Health Authority, BC Women’s Hospital, Providence Health Care, and Simon Fraser University focused on evaluating specialized inpatient perinatal substance use services and developing scalable models of care for hospital and community settings across British Columbia.