Moving Forward Together in Aboriginal Women's Health: - Theses ...

Moving Forward TogetherJanet Kellyoften a gap between directed strategies and the realities occurring at theoperational level (for example the health checks in primary schools thatuncovered a family of high needs). The newly developing health service hadno basis or ‘normality’ to bounce back to, it was still growing, shifting andforming within a health system that was also shifting and reforming.Most of the staff members and co-researchers were Aboriginal women. As wellas being health professionals, they were also members of Aboriginalcommunities, with close links to families and community situations. I, as anon-Aboriginal nurse could go home and forget about work but many of thesewomen went home and continued to work unofficially. These added layers ofcomplexity are important to acknowledge and have been explored in otherstudies (see for example Genat 2001). During the times of increased grief andloss from staff or community illness and tragedy, it was especially importantfor all staff members to attend to self care, and caring for each other. Oftenduring the first eighteen months of the health service, there was no managerpresent to take notice of low staff morale, and staff members continued on asbest they could. At these times I extended my nurse/researcher position bybeing supportive and suggesting options for counselling and further support.This was an important aspect of maintaining highly ethical, responsive andcaring research (National Health and Medical Research Council 2003).Choosing priority areasIn order for this research to be meaningful, the three main co-researchers and Iwere keen to focus on areas that needed attention, rather than things that werealready working well. From the mapping exercise we had ascertained thatclinical services, chronic conditions programs and school health expos wererelatively well resourced and accessed. Overall however, the AboriginalOutreach Health Service was still developing, getting to know and gettingknown by Aboriginal women, their families and communities, and otherorganisations. Due to complex local and wider historical issues, such as theorganisational name change and many years of colonising and patriarchalhealth practices, co-researchers identified the need to actively and positivelypromote services and staff while also increasing networking and referralpathways.237