Marilou Gagnon, RN, PhD
Associate Professor | School of Nursing | University of Ottawa

30 Mar 2017 | 7pm SH-2800 | UQAM | 200 rue Sherbrooke O.

Despite the expansion, multiplication, and simplification of treatment options over time, side effects of HAART continue to affect people living with HIV. Yet, we see a clear disconnect be- tween the way side-effects are normalized, routinized, framed, and at times, rendered invisi- ble within health care practice and the way they are experienced by people living with HIV.

This disconnect will be the starting point for Marilou Gagnon’s lecture. Using the personal stories of people living with HIV she collected over the course of her two-year qualitative study on the experience of side-effects (2013-2015) and body mapping workshops (2015-2016), Gagnon will seek to create a treatment counter-narrative. Within the contemporary context, where antiretroviral treatment is considered the cornerstone of the HIV response, creating space to share the stories generally excluded from dominant narratives of HAART becomes essen- tial. Gagnon will share these counter-narratives and discuss their implications.

Marilou Gagnon is Associate Professor at the School of Nursing, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Ottawa and Director of the Unit for Critical Research in Health. Her work is un- derpinned by critical and sociopolitical approaches. Her fields of study include questions re- lated to the body and technology, power and discourse, and social justice. As a member of the University Chair in Forensic Nursing, she is working on a number of projects on HIV criminal- ization, HIV-related stigma and discrimination in health care settings, and human rights. She is the founder of the Harm Reduction = Nursing Care Campaign and the Coalition of Nurses and Nursing Students for Supervised Injection Services. She is also the Editor of Aporia Books and the blog: The Radical Nurse. She served on the board of directors of the Canadian Association of Nurses in AIDS Care (CANAC) and was elected twice consecutively as Quebec representative (2009–2013). She then served as Expert Advisor: Policy, Research and Advocacy for 3 years (2013-2016). She sat on the board of directors of the Bureau régional d’Action Sida (BRAS) in Gatineau between 2012 and 2014. She joined the board of directors of the Canadian HIV/AIDS Le- gal Network in 2013 for a first mandate and a second mandate in 2015. She is currently Chair of that Board.
The lecture will take place in French with a bilingual Powerpoint presentation.