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A community-based program to reduce acute rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease in northern AustraliaIn Australia’s north, Aboriginal peoples live with world-high rates of rheumatic heart disease (RHD) and its precursor, acute rheumatic fever (ARF); driven by social and environmental determinants of health. We undertook a program of work to strengthen RHD primordial and primary prevention using a model addressing six domains: housing and environmental support, community awareness and empowerment, health literacy, health and education service integration, health navigation and health provider education.
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Common and Rare Genetic Variants That Could Contribute to Severe Otitis Media in an Australian Aboriginal PopulationOur goal was to identify genetic risk factors for severe otitis media (OM) in Aboriginal Australians.
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Understanding and working with different worldviews to co-design cultural security in clinical mental health settings to engage with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander clientsCreating the conditions for meaningful relationships is essential to understanding Aboriginal worldviews and co-designing ways of working to achieve better health outcomes. Non-Aboriginal health professionals struggle to recognise the importance of social relationships to Aboriginal peoples and tensions emerge due to these different worldviews informed by different ontologies and epistemologies. This is more so in clinical settings where training and models of care are often inadequate for working with Aboriginal people.
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Climate change, activism, and supporting the mental health of children and young people: Perspectives from Western AustraliaThe climate crisis has detrimental impacts on the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people. Psychological effects include feelings of fear, overwhelm, worry, distress, hopelessness and anger; PTSD; depression; anxiety; phobias; panic disorder; sleep disturbances; attachment disorders; learning difficulties; substance abuse; shock and trauma symptoms; adjustment problems; behavioural problems; and, suicidal thinking.
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Aboriginal perspectives on recognising clinical deterioration in their child and communicating concerns to cliniciansTo explore the perspectives of family members of Aboriginal children about a) their involvement in recognising clinical deterioration in a hospital setting and b) the effectiveness of a poster designed to promote family involvement.
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Co-Designing Health Service Evaluation Tools That Foreground First Nation Worldviews for Better Mental Health and Wellbeing OutcomesIt is critical that health service evaluation frameworks include Aboriginal people and their cultural worldviews from design to implementation. During a large participatory action research study, Elders, service leaders and Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal researchers co-designed evaluation tools to test the efficacy of a previously co-designed engagement framework. Through a series of co-design workshops, tools were built using innovative collaborative processes that foregrounded Aboriginal worldviews.
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Healing Right Way: Study protocol for a stepped wedge cluster randomised controlled trial to enhance rehabilitation services and improve quality of life in Aboriginal Australians after brain injuryDespite higher incidence of brain injury among Aboriginal compared with non-Aboriginal Australians, suboptimal engagement exists between rehabilitation services and Aboriginal brain injury survivors. Aboriginal patients often feel culturally insecure in hospital and navigation of services post discharge is complex.
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Improving the well-being for young people living with rheumatic heart disease: A peer support pilot program through Danila Dilba Health ServiceAboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in Australia have an inequitable burden of acute rheumatic fever (ARF) and rheumatic heart disease (RHD), concentrated among young people and necessitating ongoing medical care during adolescence. There is an unmet need for improved well-being and support for these young people to complement current biomedical management.
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The Development and Implementation of a Culturally Safe Survey for Measuring Knowledge, Attitudes and Values around FASD and Alcohol Use During Pregnancy in a Remote Australian Aboriginal Community SettingGlenn Martyn Pearson Symons BA (Education) PhD Candidate B.A. (Hons) PhD. Director of First Nations Strategy and Leadership; Head, First Nations
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Conducting decolonizing research and practice with Australian First Nations to close the health gapThe purpose of this paper is to highlight a perspective for decolonizing research with Australian First Nations and provide a framework for successful and sustained knowledge translation by drawing on the recent work conducted by a research group, in five remote communities in North-Western Australia.