Features of the Australian Health Care System

This article discusses the features of the Australian health care system, including the Sun Smart health promotion program, advantages and disadvantages of the Medicare system, health-related needs for individuals, and political issues affecting indigenous health policy development.

Running head: FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

1FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
Answer 1
Sun smart health promotion program is the Australian health promotional campaign of
which, the primary aim is to reduce the incidences related to skin cancer and decrease the
morbidity and mortality rates. This program was commenced by the joint venture of cancer
council Victoria and Victorian health promotional foundation in the year 1988 (Sun Smart
program, 2018). Nowadays, Sun smart has been evolved as a multifaceted program and provides
guidance against ultraviolet radiation. The promotional program was spread to each territory of
Australia and due to its deeper reach, the World Health Organization also collaborated with the
sunshine organization in 2004. The two principles of primary healthcare that the sunshine used
were:
 Educating the people regarding skin cancer and providing them with the idea
related to prevention or control of such issue.
 They also provided them with effective diet and nutrition suggestions to control
the skin cancer (Sun Smart program, 2018).
Answer 2
Advantages
 Financially it helps the people of Australia by covering 100 % of the fees of big
and quality healthcare professionals and allows the people with low socio-
economic status to avail quality healthcare.
 It also helps to lower the cost of costly lifesaving drugs and provides the low SES
people to use such drugs for their health improvement (Meadows et al., 2015).

2FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
Disadvantages
 These benefits of Australian Medicare are not valid, if the patient seeks healthcare
assistance in abroad and a country of which healthcare system differs from
Australia, thereby it limits the reach of Medicare facility to a broader section that
seeks medical help in abroad.
 It has been seen that healthcare facilities that provide Medicare covering are
failed to provide quality care to the patients, therefore, the bigger disadvantage of
Medicare is not being able to provide quality healthcare to the patients. Thereby,
promoting inequality in the system (Nicholson et al., 2012).
Answer 3
Three health related needs for Marcus will be –
 Seeking a healthcare expert’s assistance so that his diabetic condition can be
controlled. Nicholson et al. (2012) mentions that hyperglycemia condition can be
treated with diet and exercise for a temporary time period, after which medication
is required.
 The second need will be registering his name in the Medicare system so that if
requires, he could access healthcare service using that Medicare system.
 To stop his smoking habit, he will be provided with rehabilitation care so that his
smoking habit do not affect his diabetic condition by increasing it.
The effect of political issues that impact upon indigenous health policy development are

3FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
 The first political issue that affect the healthcare policy of aboriginals in Australia
is compromising paternalism that is affecting the healthcare related rights of
aboriginal women. It has been witnessed through history that paternalism is one
of the big reason in the history of policy making for aboriginal people that has
created a gap in healthcare attainment of aboriginal people (Viruell-Fuentes et al.,
2012). The missionaries and governmental laws related to healthcare has broken
the culture and created segregation of their values. This, along with less
opportunity for education, employment and other self-development routes has
limited their attainment of better health compared to the non-indigenous female in
the country (Hankivsky, 2012).
 Social discrimination, human rights violation, lack of involvement in mainstream
are the primary social aspect that prevents the indigenous population to attain the
healthcare. It has been seen that indigenous people face much more health related
adverse effects than non-indigenous population and it effects their health and
emotional wellbeing adversely (Hankivsky, 2012). Further, structural inequality
that distributes power, wealth and control unevenly throughout the society is the
primary issue that creates the gap between the socio-economic status of
indigenous and nonindigenous population. This inequality not only affected the
health, but also the status in the society, educational and political power of the
community (Viruell-Fuentes et al., 2012).

4FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
Answer 4
A.
Due to the age gap and environment where they grow up, there are several differences
between the health and wellbeing approach of Sita and Anita.
 Due to change in food habits, Sita has the chance to develop diabetes, whereas,
Anita will not develop diabetes soon as she has her diet habit as per Australian
environment.
 Sita will focus more on traditional Indian healthcare approach, however, Anita
will go for modern Australian healthcare treatments as their approach to health is
different.
B.
A dietician and physiotherapist will be appointed for Sita so that she can maintain her
diet and perform needed exercise to maintain healthy balance.
C.
Sita has a top level healthcare insurance, and due to this she will be able to utilize the
prime and quality healthcare services at bigger healthcare facilities in Australia, This will help
her to attain health faster and with the consultation of highly abled healthcare professionals, she
will be able to improve her health condition, compared to a person with no health insurance.
D.
1. Greater Dandenong community health services for Indians

5FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
2. Monash health community
E.
As an Indian, Sita must be having several cultural traits in her personality and approach
in healthcare that I need to be aware of while caring for her health condition. For this purpose, I
will engage myself in communication with Sita so that I can observe her cultural traits for a day.
While creating action plan for interventions, I will ask Sita to review it so that I can comply the
application of intervention with the traditional Hindu cultural norms (Hook et al., 2013). While
communicating with her regarding her cultural norms, I will show compassion and will try to
engage with her so that she can reveal every minute details of her cultural beliefs to me and I can
take care of those points prior to application. Further, I will not try to make changes in her food
habit, but also will implement nutritious elements within her diet so that she can have nutrition
food and can improve her immunity level. Further, I would communicate with her related to her
cultural habits that can affect her heath condition and would provide her examples, so that she
can change her diet habits according to her health complication (Weech-Maldonado et al., 2012).

6FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
References
Hankivsky, O. (2012). Women’s health, men’s health, and gender and health: Implications of
intersectionality. Social science & medicine, 74(11), 1712-1720.
Hook, J. N., Davis, D. E., Owen, J., Worthington Jr, E. L., & Utsey, S. O. (2013). Cultural
humility: Measuring openness to culturally diverse clients. Journal of Counseling
Psychology, 60(3), 353.
Meadows, G. N., Enticott, J. C., Inder, B., Russell, G. M., & Gurr, R. (2015). Better access to
mental health care and the failure of the Medicare principle of universality. The
Medical Journal of Australia, 202(4), 190-194.
Nicholson, C., Jackson, C. L., Marley, J. E., & Wells, R. (2012). The Australian experiment:
how primary health care organizations supported the evolution of a primary health
care system. The Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine, 25(Suppl 1),
S18-S26.
SunSmart program. (2018). SunSmart program - SunSmart. Retrieved from
http://www.sunsmart.com.au/about/sunsmart-program
Viruell-Fuentes, E. A., Miranda, P. Y., & Abdulrahim, S. (2012). More than culture: structural
racism, intersectionality theory, and immigrant health. Social science &
medicine, 75(12), 2099-2106.

7FEATURES OF THE AUSTRALIAN HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
Weech-Maldonado, R., Elliott, M. N., Pradhan, R., Schiller, C., Hall, A., & Hays, R. D. (2012).
Can hospital cultural competency reduce disparities in patient experiences with
care?. Medical care, 50, S48.