Isolation to Impact: DST in Cancer Care
Stories change systems because they change people. That truth sits at the heart of our conversation with Jackdaw Bones, a transgender cancer survivor who used digital storytelling to transform a personal ordeal into a tool for empathy and training within healthcare. Jack’s journey began with a politicized identity, a late-stage diagnosis, and a decision to speak even when silence felt safer. In a digital story workshop, Jack distilled a broad call for systemic change into one vivid moment: a biopsy appointment where bias met resistance, and a single act of human connection shifted everything. By focusing on a specific scene rather than an abstract argument, the story invites viewers to feel the stakes of dignity in care and to see how small gestures can influence life-or-death decisions. It’s advocacy through intimacy, and it works.
The episode traces how digital stories are made: voiceover, personal images, and crisp editing guided by trained facilitators. Yet the craft is in the choices—what to include, what to leave out, and where to centre the viewer’s senses. Jack, an artist and writer, wrestled with scope. With coaching, they aimed the lens at a turning point that made the cost of bias undeniable. In that room, a clinician’s disdain almost stopped care; a technician’s simple hand on Jack’s hand restored resolve. That contact, risky during COVID, became a signal: you are worth care. The scene illustrates an essential principle in patient-centred care and trauma-informed practice—validation precedes compliance. When patients feel seen and safe, they stay. When they don’t, they leave, sometimes with fatal consequences.
Taking the film from a BC Cancer workshop facilitated by Krystle Schofield to the BC Cancer Summit amplified its impact. In-person screening brought catharsis and dialogue: tears in the room, thoughtful pushback, and rare vulnerability from cisgender men who stepped forward to reflect. That response matters for culture change; the audiences missing from conversations about shame and stigma must be invited in with empathy rather than accusation. Jack’s story did that—it gave people language, an entry point, and a feeling that stayed after the lights came up. For clinicians and administrators, these stories function as micro-simulations: emotionally rich, low risk, and highly memorable. They surface blind spots and model behaviours—pronoun respect, nonjudgmental tone, and compassionate touch—that improve outcomes for trans patients and, by extension, everyone.
Episode 52 Key Messages
0:45 Meet Jack Bones
2:02 Why Digital Storytelling
4:45 Choosing the Story’s Focus
6:28 The Biopsy Turning Point
9:20 Stubbornness, Dignity, and Support
12:10 Workshop to Summit Screening
14:45 An Unexpected Reunion
16:15 Audience Reactions and Dialogue
19:00 Hopes for the Story’s Reach
21:05 Making More Work and Sharing
22:40 The Ocean Moment of Freedom
Jack hopes the film continues to circulate inside BC Cancer for staff education, patient orientation, and broader awareness. They also plan to create new work—fictional shorts that use allegory to explore identity, disability, and resilience. We talk about another meaningful moment: floating shirtless after chest surgery, surrounded by eagles and open ocean. That image—body at peace, held by water—contains a counter-narrative to crisis. It’s a reminder that healing requires both competent systems and moments of unfiltered beauty. As a search-friendly takeaway, healthcare leaders will recognize themes like LGBTQ+ health equity, inclusive communication, patient engagement, narrative medicine, and digital storytelling in healthcare. Listeners leave with a practical impulse: notice the small acts that keep patients in care, and repeat them. If one hand on one hand can save a life, imagine what a team trained in empathy can do.
About Our Guest
Jackdaw Bones describes them self as an "eremite" and occasionally ventures out of their home in the woods to show the shiny things they've made, in true covid style.
They've been a practising artist ever since their youth, using the lenses of cameras and inks to explore ideas of self, relationships to the natural world, and the terror/joy of living..
Jack is a dropout from an art school that has since disappeared to make way for training industrial workers, though they consider their experiences with disastrous experiments over the years their most valuable teacher. They revel in the beautiful chaos of learning from other artists, from books, other artists, and fucking up. The process is where the joy lay for them, and indeed that joy is built into the foundation of every piece they make.
They are disabled, and a cancer survivor. They have worked hard over the years to get to the level where they can produce art without sacrificing their health, so while their pieces may not be perfect, the imperfection belies the passion, determination, joy, and gratitude they feel when practising.
Check out Jack’s art here
About Co-Created
Co-Created is a podcast that takes you behind the scenes of digital storytelling. On each episode, host Kristy Wolfe dives into conversations with the storytellers and facilitators who bring digital stories to life.
If this particular conversation resonated with you, tell a friend or a colleague about Co-Created or share one of the digital stories we were talking about. You can find the stories here.
Co-Created is presented by Common Language DST, digital storytelling facilitation training for health and wellness changemakers and is supported by the team at Snack Labs.
