Growing a healthy future for our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children is the focus of this year’s Mackay Hospital and Health Service Closing the Gap Forum.
The forum is a co-ordinated approach for healthcare and community service providers to achieve life expectancy parity for First Nations people by 2031.
Mackay HHS Chief Executive Lisa Davies Jones said it would explore opportunities to enhance access to better healthcare and education to improve the early life outcomes of child, youth and young people.
“It will help enhance our understanding of what’s required at a local level to close the gap and improve service integration. No one organisation can do this alone,” Ms Davies Jones said.
The forum supports a commitment by Queensland Health to reduce inequalities in health outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
“We will be highlighting and addressing the challenges experienced in closing the gap between the developmental outcomes of Indigenous and non-Indigenous children and youth aged 0-18 years of age,” she said.
Ms Davies Jones said partnerships between service providers needed to be strengthened.
“Local health systems need to be strengthened, redesigned and reoriented to better listen and support First Nations peoples,” she said.
Ms Davies Jones said the Queensland Health Equity reform was driving the approach to improving the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
This reform builds on more than 30 years of activity in Queensland and nationally by adopting a social justice and rights-based approach to First Nations’ health.
Hospital and Health Boards now have a legislative requirement to have a strategy for achieving health equity with First Nations people.
“Mackay HHS is in the process of creating this first strategy so the results of the forum will help influence its creation,” she said.
The inaugural Closing the Gap Forum was held in March 2019 with last year’s forum cancelled due to COVID-19.
The forum is on 29 June from 7.45am-3.30pm at the Mackay Entertainment and Convention Centre.
Presenters include Mackay Hospital and Health Board member Adrienne Barnett.
The keynote speaker is Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Clinical Network co-chair and Lowitja Institute Research Knowledge Translation advisor Dr Mark Wenitong.
Other guest speakers include:
- Haylene Grogan: Deputy Director-General Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Division, Queensland Health
- Matthew Cooke: Queensland Aboriginal and Islander Health Council chairperson
- Dr Elisabeth Hoehn: Queensland Centre for Perinatal and Infant Mental Health
- Erin Mulherin: Early Childhood Education and Care, Department of Education
- Robin Whyte and Karin Barron – Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director Mackay, Northern Queensland Primary Health Network
- Carolina Mazza and Andrew Doyle – Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Community Health Service Mackay
- Kaiyu Van Tonder: Practice Manager for The Courage Project, Bravehearts
- Dr Jacinta Tobin: Mackay HHS, Department of Child and Adolescent Health
Thank you to our sponsors Northern Queensland Primary Health Network (NQPHN), Mackay Regional Council and Arrow Energy for helping make this event possible.
