CRCATSIH Program 2: Healthy Communities and Settings
Program Leaders: Alwin Chong
Program Manager: Vanessa Harris
Administrative Support Officer: Cheryl Cole
Goal: An improved understanding of the determinants of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health |
What’s the program about?
‘Healthy Communities and Settings’ is focused on supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities to develop wellbeing and resilience.
The Program 2 research agenda is built on the work of the Social Determinants of Health program at our predecessor organisation, the Cooperative Research Centre for Aboriginal Health (CRCAH). A body of work has accumulated that suggests the conventional indicators used in mainstream social determinants research are not necessarily appropriate for use when tracking health outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations.
The program will develop knowledge, and evaluate tools and resources to give communities a stronger capacity to address the underlying social determinants of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health.
Scope:
Improvements in individual health are more likely to be sustained over the long term when the social and physical environment is positive and supportive. Some of the broader social and environmental factors identified as important to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health include:
- intergenerational trauma
- the impact of racism
- relationship to land
- connectedness to community and family
- self-determination and community control
- identity.
Stakeholders:
The outputs of Program 2 will be useful to primary care practitioners, public health practitioners, managers and policy makers from:
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health organisations
- other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community organisations
- other primary health services
- local governments
- the education sector
- corrections, law and justice sectors
Current research
- Understanding and addressing racism against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians through the LEAD program
- Creating healthy environments: Development and trial of an integrated model for Aboriginal health promotion and its evaluation
- Aboriginal adult literacy campaign – Stage 1
- Revitalizing Health for All – International Indigenous Representative Group
- Publication: Art into Health: Puntu Palyarrikuwanpa (Aboriginal Men Becoming Well) by Dr Brian McCoy
Future research
Current projects
Understanding and addressing racism against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians through the LEAD program
Previous research has shown that racist attitudes towards Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are widespread in Australian society, and that these attitudes have a detrimental impact on people’s health and wellbeing. This project aims to bring a stronger Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspective to a broader program of work, the LEAD (Localities Embracing and Accepting Diversity) program, which is being undertaken by the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation. The project will ensure that those components of the LEAD evaluation of concern to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities are implemented appropriately. It also seeks to ensure that the benefit of LEAD is maximised for both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, and for policymakers and service providers.
Creating healthy environments: Development and trial of an integrated model for Aboriginal health promotion and its evaluation
The Melbourne-based project team is conducting a case study on the development and implementation of evaluation protocols for health promotion programs that are culturally appropriate and incorporate the social and environmental determinants of Aboriginal health. The key focus is on establishing and evaluating an Aboriginal Health Promotion Network that will undertake a range of activities around improving health promotion practices and systems across the Murray–Goulburn region of Central Victoria.
Aboriginal adult literacy campaign – Stage 1
This project has emerged out of a CRCAH-sponsored workshop in Alice Springs in April 2009 that examined the relationship between adult literacy and health, the international experience of the impact of adult literacy campaigns, and the details of how they were conducted to optimise success. Researchers will conduct a pilot Aboriginal Adult Literacy Campaign in one region, to establish whether or not government should be asked to undertake a national Aboriginal Adult Literacy Campaign. The Lowitja Institute is supporting the preparatory stage which involves gaining support; securing funding from philanthropic and government sources; and establishing arrangements for parallel research activities, including the development of a relevant dataset to allow impact to be monitored and analysed over time.
Revitalizing Health for All – International Indigenous Representative Group.
This study was funded by Canada’s Teasdale Corti Foundation and involved separate research projects in Canada, Aotearoa (New Zealand) and Australia. The study was conceived in 2005 at a meeting of the Peoples’ Health Assembly held in Ecuador as a way of documenting the importance of Comprehensive Primary Health Care (CPHC) as an appropriate and essential system response to improving the health of the world’s Indigenous and marginalised peoples. The CRC for Aboriginal Health and now the Lowitja Institute supported the Australian leg of the study with funding for mentors for each of the projects, which commenced in 2008–09 at locations in Alice Springs (managed by Central Australian Aboriginal Congress); Utopia in Central Australia (managed by the Urapuntja Health Service); and in Melbourne (managed by the Victorian Aboriginal Health Service). All three projects have now finished and a regional commentary report detailing the outcomes of the three projects will be available on our website soon. More information and resources at the Revitalizing Health for All page.
Publication: Art into Health: Puntu Palyarrikuwanpa (Aboriginal Men Becoming Well) by Dr Brian McCoy
This beautiful full-colour booklet describes a unique collection of 15 paintings through which Aboriginal men from the Western Desert offer their perspectives on their lives and wellbeing through art. Using contemporary techniques and methods, the artists present a wide range of narratives thatlink ancient ways of understanding and describing their world today. The collection, therefore, provides an important and valuable body of knowledge about Aboriginal health. Copies can be purchased for $15 each (post and handling included). Enquiries by email to publications@lowitja.org.au
Future research
Health Promotion Capacity Building: From Tools to Training
In 2011 Program 2 is commencing health promotion initiative will be undertaken in four stages. Completion is expected by mid-2014. This program of work will involve:
- Stage 1: undertake a desk-top audit and identify gaps in the tools available for health promotion for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
- Stages 2-4: develop new tools where gaps exist, pilot the use of those tools, and then train people to implement and evaluate the tools in health promotion settings.
Our aim with this work is to equip health promotion officers with the skills to identify community health promotion needs and then to develop local or larger programs to meet those needs. See Expressions of Interest and update in Wangka Pulka, December 2011, p 8.