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Articles on Indigenous health

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Mental illness is more common among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders than in the non-Indigenous population. From shutterstock.com

‘Have you been feeling your spirit was sad?’ Culture is key when assessing Indigenous Australians’ mental health

Maree Hackett, UNSW and Geoffrey Spurling, The University of Queensland

A culturally specific screening tool for depression has been successfully tested among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. This is why it's so important we start rolling it out.
Researchers are testing an equity-based model in emergency departments, mental health agencies and hospital units. (Shutterstock)

Equity in health care improves people’s health

Annette J. Browne, University of British Columbia

When care is equity-oriented, patients report fewer depression and trauma symptoms, less chronic pain and improved quality of life.
Australia sees higher rates of disability in the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population than the non-Indigenous population. From shutterstock.com

Why Aboriginal voices need to be front and centre in the disability Royal Commission

John Gilroy, University of Sydney and Jennifer Smith-Merry, University of Sydney

The experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians must be at the forefront of the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability.
Australia’s first Aboriginal Brain Injury Coordinator, Rebecca Clinch, with brain injury survivor Justin Kickett. Edith Cowan University

Aboriginal Australians want care after brain injury. But it must consider their cultural needs

Beth Armstrong, Edith Cowan University and Juli Coffin, Telethon Kids Institute

The absence of Indigenous Australians in rehabilitation services has created the belief they don't want therapy. The reality is they want services which better meet their cultural needs.
Being separated from their children affects the mental well-being of Aboriginal mothers in prison. ChrisMilesProductions/Shutterstock

Aboriginal mothers are incarcerated at alarming rates – and their mental and physical health suffers

Sacha Kendall, University of Technology Sydney; Eileen Baldry, UNSW; Elizabeth Sullivan, University of Newcastle; Juanita Sherwood, University of Sydney, and Stacey Lighton, University of Technology Sydney

Aboriginal mothers in prison feel intergenerational trauma and the forced removal of their children are the most significant factors impacting their health and well-being.
Detail from a poster designed by the Indigenous creative agency Iscariot Media, which highlights the problem of cyberbullying. Author provided

We need to do more about cyberbullying against Indigenous Australians

Bronwyn Carlson, Macquarie University and Ryan Frazer, Macquarie University

Online abuse has been in the spotlight during this election campaign and AFL season. But researchers and policy-makers alike need to do more to understand cyberbullying against Indigenous Australians.
The antibiotics commonly used to treat school sores, a skin infection affecting thousands of Aboriginal kids, are out of stock. Terry Trewin/AAP

Antibiotic shortages are putting Aboriginal kids at risk

Asha Bowen, Telethon Kids Institute

Almost half of Aboriginal kids living remotely will have a school sore at any one time. But there aren't enough of the right antibiotics to treat them.
Over the past five years, one in every four children who died by suicide in Australia was Indigenous. Shutterstock

Why are we losing so many Indigenous children to suicide?

Pat Dudgeon, University of Western Australia and Tanja Hirvonen, Flinders University

Poverty and social exclusion play a big role in Indigenous child suicide. The causes are complex but we know enough to act now to reduce the number of deaths in our communities.
The same patterns have emerged over the last decade of reaching for the same targets. from shutterstock.com

Four lessons from 11 years of Closing the Gap reports

Nicholas Biddle, Australian National University

Some targets seem easier to meet than others, while some are just plain unreliable. Here are four things we've learnt from the last decade of Closing the Gap policy.
A history of dispossession and transgenerational trauma underlie the day-to-day struggles of Indigenous people. from shutterstock.com

It’s despair, not depression, that’s responsible for Indigenous suicide

Timothy Carey, Flinders University

A diagnosis of mental illness is only one in a number of risk factors for suicide. And for Indigenous Australians, a history of dispossession and disempowerment plays a much bigger role.
Morningstar Mercredi, pictured on November 16, 2018, woke up from a surgery at 14 and discovered her developing baby was gone. What remained was an incision from her panty line to her belly button, cut without her permission. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jason Franson

Canada’s shameful history of sterilizing Indigenous women

Erika Dyck, University of Saskatchewan

Recent revelations of the coerced sterilization of Indigenous women in Canada are part of a long, complex and disturbing history -- in which feminism became a fight to keep one's own children.
People with disability living in remote communities may receive money for supports, but that doesn’t mean there’s anywhere to purchase them. from shutterstock.com

Indigenous people with disability have a double disadvantage and the NDIS can’t handle that

Scott Avery, University of Technology Sydney

The NDIS has good intentions, but its design doesn't seem to support the unique needs of Indigenous people living with a disability, particularly if they're living in remote communities.

Related Topics

  1. Aboriginal health
  2. Closing the Gap
  3. Indigenous
  4. Indigenous people
  5. Indigenous policy
  6. Mental health
  7. northern territory
  8. Smoking
  9. Social determinants of health
  10. Suicide

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