Grounded in the Present and Anticipating the Future.

A new year is dawning and along with it, the first issue of the Canadian Journal of Nursing Leadership (CJNL) for the year 2025. We begin the year with significant and persistent health and healthcare challenges. Recently released data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information indicate that 5.4 million Canadians aged 18 years and older (17%) report not having access to a regular healthcare provider (CIHI 2024a). Mental health concerns are on the rise and made worse by intersections with gender and other social determinants of health, with many people experiencing delays in care or not receiving it at all (CIHI 2024b). Emergency departments are overburdened as more and more Canadians seek care there for conditions that could have been managed in primary care (CIHI 2024a). The social determinants of health have worsened as the cost of living has skyrocketed (Park 2024) along with gender-based violence and structurally embedded and pervasive racism (Government of Canada 2024a, 2024b).