Paper Short Abstract:

I will discuss my multiple involvements (as activist, researcher, expert) and collaborative efforts in connection with CSOs and municipality. l reflect on the conflictive engagements and limits of collaborative ethnography when attempting to untangle healthcare sector for migrants.

Paper Abstract:

Public healthcare sector in Poland has been under continuous crisis in last decades (Watson 2006; Sowada et al 2019), and patients faced many challenges when seeking medical treatments. The situation had been far more difficult for foreign patients, both these with none (or very limited) and these with advanced knowledge of Polish language. Migrants and refugees encounter a complicated system of mixture of public, co-payed and private sectors, with employment-based or private insurance-based system of access, lack of information and confusion about the system, as well as lack of multi-cultural education of healthcare professionals and sometimes prejudices and discrimination. This has impacted both economic migrants coming to Poland from countries across the globe and Ukrainian families that have been escaping Russian aggression since 2022.

My long cooperation with civil service organizations in Poznan resulted in active involvement in attempts to improve access to information about healthcare system through preparing leaflets and workshops. Collaborative work with CSOs aimed at producing knowledge based on narratives coming from migrants and CSO employees about migrants’ experiences with healthcare. Recently I have been invited as “an expert” to cooperate with municipality’s department for health and social services which put me in a different context.

During my presentation I will first outline my multiple involvements (as activist, researcher, expert) and collaborative efforts in connection with different social actors. Second, I will reflect on the conflictive engagements, challenges and limits of collaborative ethnography.