Aboriginal Health is everyone’s business! This was the the take-home message from our Practice Team Christmas event this year.

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According to the RACGP Standards for General Practices 4th edition, practices need to demonstrate that they are routinely recording the ATSI status in the patient health record. Is your practice compliant? (more…)

I met with Trentham GP Dr Jacques De Groot to discuss his time working in Aboriginal health in the Northern Territory. (more…)

The ongoing cost of medicines has been identified as a significant barrier to improving health care to ATSI people. Despite Aboriginal people having two to three times higher levels of illness, PBS expenditure for ATSI people is about half that of the non-Indigenous average.
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Research has found that “communication would improve if health professionals learned to listen to the Aboriginal and Torrres Strait Islander story, and let it shape the structure of their own biomedical perceptions” (Cass et al, 2002). GPs and other health professionals can provide alternative communication by using diagrams and pictures to explain disease progression, test results and the cycle of grief. (more…)

NAIDOC week is a time of remembrance of the past, but more a celebration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture. NAIDOC is celebrated over the first full week in July. Every year there is a different theme, an art competition, awards for Mr and Miss NAIDOC and a gala ball held in a different capital city. (more…)

Elspeth Rowe has recently joined the Ballarat and District Aboriginal Cooperative in the new position of Antenatal Midwife/Maternal Child Health Nurse. (more…)

Specialists can now annotate scripts with “Close the Gap” so their ATSI patients can receive free or low cost medications. The patient must be referred by a GP who is participating in and registered for the Indigenous Health PIP. (more…)

Andrew Green is a local Aboriginal man who has worked at the Ballarat and District Aboriginal Co-op for 7 years. He has an excellent knowledge of services available to Aboriginal patients. (more…)

Olympic sprinter Kyle Vander Kuyp spoke about  his experience with depression at the opening ceremony of the Aboriginal sports carnival held in early October. (more…)

I’m pleased to announce that the guest speaker at the BDDGP AGM will be Dr Noel Hayman, who will be delivering a talk on “Closing the Gap”. (more…)

Under the ‘Close the Gap’ health initiative there will be free or low cost medicines for ATSI patients as of the first of July. ATSI patients with a Health Care Card will receive free medication, and those without a Health Care Card will pay $5.40 per script. (more…)

The new ‘Indigenous Health’ PIP payment comes into effect on the 1st of May 2010. (more…)

I have recently joined BDDGP as the Close the Gap Program coordinator. Having come from the Northern Territory, I’ve relocated back to Ballarat to be closer to family. (more…)

The poor health of Australia and Torres Strait Islander people has been compared to problems of the third world. Help close the gap. (more…)