Joyce Resin

Joyce Resin, MSW

Member: Board of Directors, Former Chair Citizen Engagement Committee

Joyce Resin has a Master’s degree in Social Work, specializing in community engagement and development, from the University of British Columbia.  She graduated from McGill University with a specialty in psychology and sociology.  She is currently the principal of Joyce Resin and Associates, a public engagement and communications firm and a fellow and consultant for IHI, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement based in Boston. Joyce has also lectured in social policy at Langara University.

Joyce has wide ranging work experience in both communications and citizen engagement development. In media, she has extensive television, print and radio journalism experience. For 25 years, she worked in broadcasting at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver, as an Executive Producer, story producer, social policy consultant, broadcaster and investigative journalist. Joyce developed, was the executive producer of, and hosted Canada’s first network television health and wellness program  entitled, “Alive! The Picture of Health.” This program was shown in over 30 countries around the world. She also developed and hosted Canada’s first network television program for people over 50, entitled The Best Years and later, 50UP! Joyce’s interest and passion in working with the elderly stemmed from that experience and she developed a series of community based conferences in partnership with the BC Women’s Hospital entitled “Bloomers” and with the YWCA of Vancouver, entitled “55@UP!…Embracing the future”.  She hosted a local phone in radio show in Vancouver dealing with a wide range of health issues and she wrote a column in the Vancouver Sun entitled “Your Guide to Good Health”. Joyce was the principal of a video production company called Vive Communications and produced dozens of videos for many public and private organizations including the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, Chevron Canada and the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation.

Joyce’s social work career began as the Director of Kitsilano Neighbourhood House in Vancouver. She later became Director of the Healthy Heart Society of BC and used her marketing, communications and community development expertise to build an innovative suite of highly successful heart health promotion initiatives around British Columbia, called “ hearts@work”. This initiative developed into a project called   “hearts@school” for elementary school age children and ultimately became an adjunct to the Vancouver Sun Run initiative. Joyce was also involved in developing the Congestive Heart Failure Collaborative in BC, in partnership with the BC Medical Association (Doctors of BC) and one of the very first collaborative initiatives in the country. Most recently, Joyce held the position of Executive Director of ImpactBC, a quality improvement organization in healthcare based in Vancouver. In that capacity, Joyce created and developed the Patient Voices Network (PVN), a unique provincial model to recruit, engage and support patients in all aspects of health care delivery in British Columbia. PVN is regarded as a model for engagement both provincially and in other jurisdictions in Canada and abroad and is currently a network of over 1000 patients and citizens engaged throughout BC. Joyce has also developed an online tool for training researchers and research teams in how to successfully engage citizens in their projects. She has consulted in the area of citizen and patient engagement with organizations across the country and in the US including the Change Foundation in Ontario, Patients Canada and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement in Boston and has travelled abroad in a consulting capacity with IHI. Joyce has worked with CIHR on a consultancy basis and as a lay reviewer for their grants.

Joyce is also a registered BCRPA fitness instructor with specialized training in fitness for older adults, cardiac rehabilitation and osteoporosis. She has been actively teaching fitness classes since 1976 and has developed a unique program for those over 50, entitled Flexercise which focuses on dynamic stretching, core and muscle strength.