For Taryn Eickmeier, well-being is measured in “inchstones,” which are all those moments when delightful things happen, no matter how small.
Eickmeier (PhD ’16, Public Health and Health Systems) 
has been in leadership roles at the Grandview Kids rehabilitation treatment centre in Durham Region since the spring of 2021. She recently took on a new role as executive lead of research, innovation and knowledge mobilization. Prior to that, she was the director of strategic communications, partnerships and engagement.
Children and youth access the services of Grandview Kids with a wide variety of needs. They may have needs pertaining to autism, infant or childhood hearing loss, mobility and motor needs, developmental delays or speech and language needs.
The not-for-profit organization provides assessments, diagnoses and outpatient treatment and therapy, as well as consultations and support for families as they navigate the complex system of community and hospital-based support for their children. The organization also participates in research activities and mentoring in the field of children’s rehabilitation and developmental medicine.
The demands are enormous. Grandview Kids sees more than 20,000 children, with 12,000 children currently waiting for services.
Despite those challenges, the organization strives to ensure that well-being doesn’t just begin and end with an assessment and a treatment program. It is about the whole journey, a journey of a lifetime for the child and their family, Eickmeier says.
“Instead of milestones, we talk about inchstones, where every moment of progress counts,” she says. “Every moment, whether it is the angle of a joint, standing on their own, speaking a new word, or learning how to use an augmented technology – all progress is celebrated here.”
Support for families
For families of Grandview Kids, care continues outside of the treatment rooms. Eickmeier oversees the Family Engagement Team, a group of parents certified as peer navigators to provide one-on-one and group support to families.
“It is incredible to see the powerful connections made between parents that help answer questions, encourage progress and create meaningful bonds within the community,” Eickmeier says. “This team is a unique feature of Grandview Kids, ensuring the family voice is embedded into the key decisions made by the organization. It is important that our services reflect the needs of families, both during and after appointments.”
Consider critical evidence
Eickmeier, who was born in North Bay but grew up in York Region, began her journey into child and family rehabilitation with a kinesiology degree from Brock University (2008). During her studies, she became interested in population health and social determinants of health.
“I was seeing how the social constructs of children’s lives were shaping who they were and the opportunities available to them. I felt this need to help provide the opportunities they might not naturally have.” She went on to Dalhousie University where she got her master’s in health promotion in 2010.
When she decided to do her PhD in public health, she was drawn to the University of Waterloo because of her supervisor, Rhona Hanning, a professor in Waterloo’s School of Public Health Sciences. “I was looking for a program that would meet my needs. I found that at Waterloo, and she was the supervisor I was eager to learn from,” Eickmeier says.
The PhD at Waterloo was where Eickmeier honed the strategic thinking and research skills that put her in a great position for her current role at Grandview Kids.
“Throughout the PhD work, you are pushed to consider critical evidence and to constantly assess whether something is true and based on evidence. You need to ensure that everything that you are putting forward is accurate and sound,” she says.
A new role
Those skills will help her in her new role, one that involves doing data collection and analysis for the clinicians who may be interested in new treatments, therapies, or creative ways of changing clinical practice to improve the services to families.
It also involves partnering with other local children’s treatment centres, research institutes and universities that would like to be involved in research at Grandview Kids. “One of the first things I want to do is form a family research advisory council to find out what kind of research our families are interested in,” she adds.
She was also successful last year in getting her credentialed evaluator designation through the Canadian Evaluation Society. “With that designation, I can lead some rigorous evaluations for Grandview Kids,” she says. Evaluators measure outcomes, or satisfaction, but do so in a scientific way to understand how well the programs are working.
She adds that her PhD also gave her a grounding in provincial and federal components of the complex health system and the way programs are funded. “That helps me advocate for change and inform new directions for the programs and research.”
Even though her role is administrative, she gets satisfaction from helping an organization that fosters well-being in children in every aspect of their lives.
“In any leadership role, you have so many strategic, carefully planned decisions to make, and I am accountable for all the decisions that are made by my team. But children, their parents and the teams providing care are the ones who do all that great work,” she says.
