Healthcare Policy Advocacy

This article discusses the importance of healthcare policy advocacy in raising awareness for public health issues. It explores the background of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and the health issue of autism. The aim, objectives, and recommendations for effective policy advocacy are also discussed.

Running head: HEALTHCARE POLICY ADVOCACY
HEALTHCARE POLICY ADVOCACY ASSIGNMENT
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

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Introduction
Policy advocacy can be defined as a various kind of activities by non - profit or
governmental organisation to influence the decision made by the policy makers such as
government body or organisation (Mosley, 2013). Advocacy for the policy can be ranging
from the conventional methods like lobbying, litigation as well as public education and
awareness (Farrer et al., 2015). In addition to that, it can also be included as activities like
leadership development, network creation, and relationship building. Above the activities,
lobbying is specifically employed to influence the policy makers to change any particular
policy or to create a new legislative (Birkland, 2015).
In the modern health care society, advocacy for policy plays huge role for the greater
good of the people as effective policy advocacy can raise awareness among the public for a
particular health care issue which was neglected or being overlooked in a particular
community (Cohen& Marshall, 2017).Therefore, positive policy advocacy can be utilised to
implementation and the creation of the better health policy (MacIndoe& Whalen, 2013).
Hence, the purpose of this article is to advocate for a health policy for the better of
public health with respect to a particular health issue and an organisation which advocates for
that particular health issue. In that context, the organisation body that were chosen for this
article is ‘National Disability Insurance Scheme’ or NDIS. The health issue for which the
health advocacy will be provide in ‘Autism’. Therefore, in the following sections, the back
ground of the organisation body and health issues will be discussed in the comprehensive
manner. In addition to that aim, objectives, and recommendation related to this policy
advocacy will be discussed in the following sections.

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Background of the National Disability Insurance Scheme:
The inception of the National Disability Insurance Scheme occurs due to the public
inquiry which implores the Productivity Commission of the Australian Government to create
a long term disability support and care system. In this regard, the Productivity Commission of
the Australian Government received more 1000 inquiry from the disability sector and the
disability community (Ndis.gov.au, 2019). As a result of this public inquiry, the National
Disability Insurance Scheme were established in the mid- year of the 2013 by the act of NDIS
Act 2013 as well as the creation of the NDIA or National Disability Insurance Agency. The
activities and the commencement of the National Disability Insurance Scheme began in the
month of July in the same year of 2013(Ndis.gov.au, 2019). The first trial of the National
Disability Insurance Scheme began in the Tasmania followed by the South Australia, Barwon
area of Victoria, and Hunter area of New South Wales. The trial period lasted for three years
and the National Disability Insurance Scheme started working in full- fledged manner in the
year 2016 (Ndis.gov.au, 2019).
The governance of this National Disability Insurance Scheme is shared among all the
Australian government and all the government provides input and insights regards to the
policy’s scheme, governance and funding. However, National Disability Insurance Agency is
the primary administrator for this scheme and for this matter, it has a governing body.
National Disability Insurance Agency is also responsible for all the funding that this scheme
receives and requires (Ndis.gov.au, 2019). On the other hand, the Board of the National
Disability Insurance Agency is responsible for the functions, performance, and the strategic
direction of the National Disability Insurance Agency. This National Disability Insurance
Agency Board is commonly advised by the National Disability Insurance Scheme
Independent Advisory Council for the administrative manner. In addition to that,

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Commonwealth Minister for the upholding and the administration of the NDIS Act
2013(Ndis.gov.au, 2019).
National Disability Insurance Scheme works in association with several policies
which is generally handled by the National Disability Insurance Agency. These policies
include:
 Freedom of information
 Information public scheme(Ndis.gov.au, 2019)
In addition to these policies, this National Disability Insurance Scheme works with
many different strategies for the implementation and health awareness and public health
advocacy. These strategies are:
 Cultural and Linguistic Diversity Strategy – this strategy enables National
Disability Insurance Scheme to work with individuals from much different and
diverse background. The reason behind this strategy or the reason behind the
implementation is that more than 26 per cent of Australians born outside the
Australian continent in diverse culture(Ndis.gov.au, 2019).
 Rural and Remote Strategy – the aim and goal of this strategy is to provide
equality among the people in the rural area in term quality of the support and
care and accessibility to the National Disability Insurance Scheme
(Ndis.gov.au, 2019).
 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Strategy – It has been acknowledged in
many different literature that there is a gap in health care service among the
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Hence, this strategy was
implemented to provide equality to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander

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people with regard to the quality of the support and care of health care and
accessibility to the health care (Ndis.gov.au, 2019).
 Assistive Technology Strategy – It is very difficult for the disable people for
the attend their regular meeting with the general practitioner as most of them
are disable in regard to the mobility. Thence, National Disability Insurance
Scheme has implemented this strategy to provide empowerment and
sustainability to the people with disability (Ndis.gov.au, 2019).
Background of the related health issue – ‘Autism’
Autism which is known as ASD or Autism spectrum disorder can be characterize as
the challenges or difficulties faced by the repetitive behaviour, speech, social skill and non-
verbal communication (Ousley & Cermak, 2014). There is many different sub type of autism
present in the present and it can be very much influenced by the environmental and genetic
factors (Bernier et al., 2014). In case of autism, each person faces different challenges or
strength due to the reason being autism is a spectrum disorder (Anagnostou et al., 2014).
Based on the strengths and challenges faced by the each individual and their learning and
adaptive capability of the each individual, the autism can be categorised in to severely
challenged to highly skilled (Wong et al., 2015). As a result, some of the individual with
autism need extensive support in their daily live whereas some peoples need very little
support in their daily activities. In addition to the environmental and genetic factors, autism
can be influenced by the medical issues as well such as seizures, gastrointestinal disorders or
GI (Hsiao, 2014), and sleep disorders (Hollway, Aman& Butter, 2013). In addition to the
physical issues, mental issues like anxiety and depression. In a survey conducted by
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), it has been found that the approximately 164,000
individuals in Australia had autism in the year 2015 (Australian Institute of Health and
Welfare, 2019). The overall precedence rate for the autism is in Australia about 0.7 per cent

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which is around 1 person out of the 150 people (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare,
2019). The number of the incidence of autism has increased considerably from the 2009
when the numbers of affected people were approximately 64,400(Australian Institute of
Health and Welfare, 2019). Form the statistics presented above, it can be seen that the
incidence of autism is increasing day by day and in the year 2015, almost 88 per cent of all
people suffering from autism also had disability (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare,
2019). Hence, there is an urgent need of public advocacy of the policy regarding to the
autism. National Disability Insurance Scheme also provides service to the individuals
suffering from autism (Autismspectrum.org.au, 2019).
Aim and objective
As mentioned in the research of Thomson (2017), there are multiple social, cultural,
historic and communal aspects has impact the healthcare of disabled individual as a
contributing factor and hence as a result, the increased social stigma, prevalence and
healthcare complication among the disabled individual are observed. As the Australian
Bureau of Statistics (2019) has mentioned that prevalence rate of autism among Australian
children and adult cumulatively has increased up to 40%, in the year 2015, the effect of these
aspects could be easily understood from these aspects. Further, with social and communal
aspects, the social an mental stigma of autism affected individual and his/her family members
is also a major concern of for this disability (Thompson, 2016). Hence, the lack of literacy of
people about disability, the cultural aspects and the lack of knowledge about the care
management could be one of the critical aspects of the increased morbidity and mortality of
the autism related disability affected individual in Australia (Goodley, 2017). As per
Bottema-Beutel et al. (2016), the patients that are affected with autism are unable to come up
with their concern to the community healthcare centres as social stigma and hesitation are the
primary feelings that hinder them to avail healthcare facilities for their autism concerns and

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therefore such individual suffer from extremely critical healthcare conditions. Besides this, as
per Ha et al. (2014), if the healthcare facilities develop strong and effective policies for the
healthcare facilities of autism affected individuals, and do not practice them for the care
process, then the scenario for the people affected with autism would remain same (Ohan,
Ellefson & Corrigan, 2015). Further, it should also be mentioned that they would not be able
to achieve the improved health outcome for their health concern (Lu et al., 2015). Therefore,
these aims and objectives has been developed so that these modified healthcare policies for
autism affected individual’s healthcare and wellbeing could be effectively implemented the
benefit could be provided to the patients (Bottema-Beutel et al., 2015).
Hence, to achieve the healthcare advocacy for the autism affected individuals in care
process should be inclusive of community health literacy and awareness programs so that
people could understand the type and variation of healthcare services they would require and
then depending on that the healthcare interventions for autism affected individuals would be
conducted (Kenny et al., 2016). Hence, the aim of the policy would be making the healthcare
professionals working in the communities for the autism affected disability equip with
professionals skills and expertise so that while working with such individual they could make
the care process effective and make them learn about the cultural and emotional aspects
which are the primary aspects that should be followed by the healthcare professionals while
dealing with autism affected patients (Jamison et al., 2017). Besides this, the policy would
aim to develop educational sessions within the community so that the awareness program
could be spread among the community so that the community members could understand the
autism related mental disability effectively and support their health and wellbeing of such
patients (Ha et al., 2014). Further, it will also aim to spread the self-management and self-
management abilities among the autism affected people so that they can understand the
effectiveness of it.

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Further, the objectives of this paper would be:
 To make the healthcare professionals aware of the cultural and emotional
aspects they should be focusing on while conducting care for the patients
suffering from autism.
 To educate and spread awareness about the autism related disability so that
social stigma and hesitation related limitations of the patients could be
prevented and they could be provided with effective healthcare.
 To make the patients of autism aware of their health condition and make them
able to take care of their medication and preventive measures so that better
health outcome could be achieved.
 To increase the communication about the inclusiveness of the autism affected
individual in the community so that they can avail their rights within the
society and their health and wellbeing could be improved.
Recommendations
Depending on the policy aim and objectives, as well as understanding the serious
condition of the autism affected individuals in Australia, related to their increase prevalence,
morbidity and mortality rates, the patients should be provided with the following
recommendations so that their needs and requirement could be fulfilled.
The first recommendation would be developing short-term wellbeing program in the
communities where the prevalence rate of autism related disability is higher (Harrison et al.,
2017). This would help to make the community aware of their health complications and then
with increased awareness and knowledge about the autism related disability, the community
member’s ideologies about any mental illness would be altered (Teti et al., 2016, Carpenter et
al., 2016). This would further help to develop an inclusive society. Hence, the overall effect

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of this recommendation would be beneficial for the patients affected with autism and with
increased abilities related to healthcare skills; effective care would be provided to the patients
(Crane et al., 2019, Zuckerman et al., 2014).
As per Burkett et al. (2015), cultural awareness and competency is the primary
concern of the mental healthcare worldwide and hence the professionals require proper skills
and knowledge about the inclusion of culturally competent care for the healthcare of patients
suffering from mental healthcare conditions (Weiss et al., 2016). Hence, this should be one of
the primary goals of the communities so that the patients suffering from autism related
disability could be provided with culturally competent care (De Chesnay & Anderson, 2019).
Besides this, quality is another factor that is still lacking in the healthcare facilities as
majority of the patients affected with critical mental health conditions hesitate to receive
healthcare (Tavallali, Kabir & Jirwe, 2014). Therefore, it should also be one of the primary
goals of the NSID that is working for the improved health and wellbeing of the individuals
working in healthcare facilities’ of Australia (Burkett et al., 2015). Therefore, fostering
improved quality of the autism, interventions would help the patients to overcome their health
condition and with positive feedback, more patients would be able to overcome their
hesitation and social stigma and avail treatment in such improved healthcare organisations
(Fong et al., 2016, Lewis-Fernandez et al., 2016).
Besides this, depending upon the aims and objective developed for the health
advocacy of the autism affected individuals in Australia, the government should mandate the
implementation of the educational and health literacy sessions in each of the communities in
Australia (Goulart, Levey & Rech, 2018). So that people could overcome their primitive
thought process of mental disability and illness and they would be able to support the patients
of autism so that they could also become a part of the inclusive society (Wehman et al., 2014,
Preece & Trajkovski, 2017). Further, these community programs would be inclusive of

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educational learnings of the way society members and community carers could support
patients with autism so that they could be empowered and then with increases social
empowerment their health condition could be improved (McCollum, LaVesser & Berg, 2016,
McDonald & Lopes, 2016). With respect of this empowerment and self- management
strategies, the patients with autism would be assessed for their abilities of health management
and then they would be provide with intervention using which they could maintain their
health condition (Santarosa & Conforto, 2016).
Conclusion
In conclusion, it could be said that the autism is one such mental health condition or
disability, of which the prevalence rate has increased in uncontrolled manner in recent times.
Further, it was also seen that besides lack of quality healthcare and accurate interventions,
social and cultural impact related to social stigma and personal hindrance also affects the
availability of the healthcare interventions in Australia. Australian Bureau of Statistics also
mentioned these factors in the reports due to which people were unable to receive their
healthcare rights. Hence, health advocacy for autism disorder becomes one of the primary
requirements in communities, which was fulfilled by the NDIS under governmental scheme.
Hence, this paper provided a detail of the organisation and the autism related healthcare
concern and with aim and objective for the health advocacy related to autism in Australia, it
also provided several recommendations for the healthcare improvement for individuals
suffering from autism disorder.

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