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Educating the Public
Healing Canadian Healthcare is a heartfelt, firsthand call to action from veteran nurse Kathleen Boucher, offering practical solutions and powerful stories to address Canada’s deepening nursing crisis. Of all your proposed solutions, which one do you believe would have the biggest immediate impact if implemented today?
I think that if all the provinces made short infomercials about the many choices nurses have in their careers, it would help educate the public. To be cost-effective and maintain consistency, the provinces could use the same infomercials across the country.
What would you say to a young person considering nursing today, in light of the system’s current challenges?
Nursing is an excellent profession with numerous choices, allowing you to find a specialty that you enjoy helping people in. The more young people who join and remain in nursing, the faster the healthcare system will improve.
What moment or experience finally pushed you to write this book after decades in the field?
An RN with whom I work, who has over ten years of experience, kept saying to me that she did not think she would last until retirement. The fact that she felt she would not last until retirement bothered me, as we need a mixture of new graduate nurses, nurses who have been in the profession for a few years, and veteran nurses to work each shift. I listened to a webinar about writing a short, punchy book. A punchy book, by definition, is a short read that requires a topic that needs to be discussed but may be controversial. Educating the public about nursing and asking Canadians to help improve nursing enrolment & retention may seem like a lofty goal. The nursing crisis is a subject that warrants discussion.
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Healing Canadian Healthcare: Ideas to Improve Nursing Enrolment & Retention
Kathleen Boucher’s Healing Canadian Healthcare is a heartfelt and practical look at the crisis gripping Canada’s nursing system. Written from the front lines by a nurse with decades of experience, the book lays out the scope of the problem, an alarming nursing shortage that predates the pandemic, and offers straightforward, actionable ideas to increase nursing enrollment and retention. The book explores what nurses really do, the highs and lows of the profession, what’s required to enter and stay in it, and how the public can get involved. It’s both a call to action and a guide for anyone who wants to understand or help fix a system under strain.
What stood out to me the most was the raw honesty in Boucher’s voice. Her writing isn’t polished in a literary way; it’s real, lived-in, practical, and personal. That gave it power. She doesn’t sugarcoat the exhaustion or emotional toll that nurses face, nor does she rant or assign blame unfairly. Instead, she offers stories that hit hard, like the night she worked a ward with thirty patients and two nurses, or how shame stopped a patient from mentioning he couldn’t afford medication. I was moved. I felt both rage and admiration. Boucher’s knack for weaving human moments into a policy discussion makes this book something more than just a proposal, it’s a plea from someone who’s seen too much to stay quiet.
What’s especially effective is the book’s consistent use of “call to action” moments at the end of each chapter. These reminders keep the reader engaged and focused on solutions. The structure is clear and easy to follow, making the content approachable for a wide audience. Many of the ideas Boucher shares, like improving orientation for floating nurses or color-coding supply rooms, are practical and immediately actionable. They may seem small, but they’re smart, realistic steps that can create real change when widely adopted. What I appreciated most is the book’s grounded optimism. You finish it not overwhelmed, but empowered, reminded that your voice can help shape the future of healthcare.
I’d recommend Healing Canadian Healthcare to students considering nursing, to policymakers who have lost touch with the bedside, and to any Canadian who wants to understand why our system is teetering. This isn’t just for anyone who might influence a future nurse or help one stay in the job. It’s a book about hope, and it made me care more.
Pages: 43 | ASIN: B0F3W93PT1
LITERARY TITAN 