Indigenous health

Open and honest dialogue between offenders, victims and Aboriginal Elders is breaking down barriers

Gail P Wallace LLB

Best-practice care and population health actions now will bring significant benefit in the long-term

Paul J Torzillo MB BS, FRACP, FCICM · Anne B Chang MB BS, PhD, FRACP

An urgent imperative to close the gap

Robert M Parker

Champions needed to scale up childhood equity efforts, not short-term solutions in ill conceived policy

Kerry Arabena

There are signs that the prevalence of whipworm infection in the NT is declining but more can be done

Amy L Crowe MB BS · Pam Smith · Linda Ward BAppSci, MMedSci · Bart J Currie FRACP, FAFPHM, DTM+H · Rob Baird MB BS, FRACP, FRCPA

The coincident seasonality of active TB cases and vitamin D deficiency suggests that low vitamin D levels may increase the likelihood of reactivation of tuberculosis. Vitamin D testing and supplementation is therefore recommended for high-risk groups.

Jennifer H MacLachlan · Benjamin C Cowie

New South Wales prisons data add to previous findings which show that Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians achieve similar hepatitis C treatment outcomes.

Jeffrey J Post · Andrew R Lloyd · Denise Monkley

This study adds overweight and obesity to the list of chronic disease risk factors highly prevalent among incarcerated youth. Changes to the food environment and the approach to physical activity in custody are needed.

Leigh Haysom PhD, MMed(ClinEpi), MB BS · Devon Indig PhD, MPH, BSc · Elizabeth Moore PhD · Louise L Hardy PhD, MPH(Hons) · Paul A van den Dolder PhD, MSc MPhysio

Objective: To determine the utility of exercise electrocardiography testing (EET) in evaluating suspected coronary artery disease in a remote Australian setting where a significant proportion of patients are Indigenous Australians.Design: Retrospective cohort study with grouping based on EET results.Patients and setting: 268 patients with suspected coronary artery disease who underwent EET at Alice Springs Hospital — a specialist teaching hospital ...

Patricia N Hurune MB ChB · Justine M O’Shea MB BS · Graeme P Maguire MB BS, PhD, FRACP · Saliya S Hewagama MB BS, FRACP

Objective: To examine the relationships between birthweight, current size, and fasting glucose and fasting insulin levels in Aboriginal adolescents.Design, participants and setting: Longitudinal prospective study of a Northern Territory Aboriginal birth cohort of 686 Aboriginal babies born at the Royal Darwin Hospital between January 1987 and March 1990, and followed up between December 2006 and January 2008 in over 40 NT locations.Main outcome measures: ...

Susan M Sayers FAAP, FRACP, PhD · Susan A Mott BSc, RN, MPH · Kay D Mann MMathStat · Mark S Pearce BSc, MSc, PhD · Gurmeet R Singh PhD, MD, FRACP

History tells us that policies fail, and services falter, when they are not developed in consultation with those for whom they are designed.

Ruth Armstrong

Using the concept of trauma-informed care to help Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and their families recover from stressful life events.

Helen M Milroy MB BS, FRANZCP, CATCAP

There are now signs of substantial improvement in the health of Indigenous people, although there are persisting problems of access and worsening issues in some areas. But there is also a conspicuous lack of health data to show impacts and help plan future activities. The new national plan to guide investment is a step forward, but issues of racism and discrimination need to also be addressed.

Kerry Arabena

Cultural competence strategies aim to make health services more accessible for patients from diverse cultural backgrounds. Recently, such strategies have focused on specific groups, and particularly Indigenous Australians, where services have failed to address large disparities in health outcomes. Limitations of cultural competence largely fall into three categories: lack of clarity around how the concept of culture is used in medicine, inadequate recognition of ...

Rosalie D Thackrah BA, GradDipEd, MA · Sandra C Thompson MPH, PhD, FAFPHM

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women are more than three times more likely to smoke during pregnancy than non-Indigenous women, greatly increasing the risk of poor birth outcomes. Our systematic review found that there is currently no evidence for interventions that are effective in supporting pregnant Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women to quit smoking, which impedes development and implementation of evidence-informed policy and ...

Megan E Passey BMed(Hons), MPH, MSc · Jamie Bryant PhD, BPsych(Hons) · Alix E Hall BPsych(Hons) · Robert W Sanson-Fisher PhD, ClinMPsych, BPsych(Hons)

This study attempts to determine the frequency and types of stressful events experienced by urban Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, and to explore the relationship between these experiences and the children’s physical health and parental concerns about their behaviour and learning ability.

Deborah A Askew PhD, MHlthSci, GradDipNutr · Philip J Schluter BSc(Hons), MSc, PhD · Geoffrey K P Spurling MB BS, FRACGP, MPH · Chelsea J R Bond BAppSci(Hons), PhD · Alex D H Brown PhD, FRACP

Children in two remote Northern Territory Aboriginal communities were studied to measure the impact of four weeks of daily swimming on rates of ear discharge with a tympanic membrane penetration and on the microbiology of the nasopharynx and middle ear.

Anna T N Stephen MPH · Amanda J Leach BAgSc(Hons), MAgSc, PhD · Peter S Morris MB BS, PhD, FRACP

IN 2009, THE ROYAL Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists awarded the Mark Sheldon Prize for Indigenous mental health to ngangkari (traditional healers) Andy Tjilari and Rupert Langkatjukur Peter. The two were further honoured in 2011 by the World Council for Psychotherapy with the Sigmund Freud Award (bestowed by the City of Vienna, Austria). The awards recognised their distinguished contributions in mental health to the ...

Robert M Parker