Addressing Health Disparities: Aboriginal Australians' Health

This report delves into the significant health disparities faced by Aboriginal Australians, a vulnerable population in Australia. It examines the social determinants of health, including socioeconomic factors, historical impacts of colonization, and cultural disintegration, which contribute to health inequities. The report highlights specific health inequalities, such as shorter life expectancy, higher rates of chronic diseases, and increased substance abuse, and discusses the impact of these disparities on health outcomes. It also identifies a target audience for policy decisions, such as the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organization (NACCHO), and provides recommendations for improving healthcare access and outcomes. The report emphasizes the crucial role of nurses in delivering patient-centered care and culturally sensitive services to address the health needs of Aboriginal communities. The report concludes by reinforcing the importance of nursing practice standards in advocating for vulnerable populations, particularly in addressing health inequities.

Running head: ABORIGINAL HEALTH
Health of an Aboriginal in Australia
Student Name
University Name
Author Note

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Why Aboriginals are vulnerable in healthcare?.........................................................................2
Social Determinants...............................................................................................................2
Health Inequities....................................................................................................................3
Health Inequalities.................................................................................................................4
Health outcomes of Aboriginals.............................................................................................5
One specific health disparity impacting aboriginals..................................................................6
Identifying a target audience to make policy decisions.............................................................6
Recommendations for the project..............................................................................................7
Conclusion (Standard of Practice).............................................................................................8
References..................................................................................................................................9

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Introduction
Health disparity is a prevalent incidence that is faced by the community in Australia.
Of all the communities present in the country, the Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islander
people have been neglected off their right to proper medical care. Today, 85% of Australians
live inside 50 kilometres of the coastline while the Northern Territory has a populace of a
little more than 200 000 individuals spread over a zone of 1.34 million square kilometres with
104 particular indigenous dialects spoken ("Australia’s disturbing health disparities set
Aboriginals apart", 2014).The Aboriginal populace of Australia is known to be the most
hindered segment of the nation's populace. The fundamental statistic disservice looked by this
area of the populace, is the inaccessibility of their region (Park, 2017, pp. 399-407).The
Australian Aboriginals are progressively helpless to therapeutic expulsion that inevitably
influences their health results. Guaranteeing access to essential human services is broadly
acknowledged as key to improving health results. In the following essay, the health
disparities faced by this community will be discussed in detail with major focus on the social
determinants, health inequities and inequalities with health outcomes. The organizations
which can help in reduction of the prevalence of the disparity will be discussed with a
personalized recommendation to improve the condition.
Why Aboriginals are vulnerable in healthcare?
Social Determinants
Native and Torres Strait Islander individuals, individuals from zones of financial
burden, individuals in rural and remote areas experience more wellbeing impediments than
different Australians (Browne-Yung, Ziersch, Baum & Gallaher, 2013, pp. 20-28). These
burdens can incorporate higher paces of ailment and shorter expectancy of life. Indigenous
Australians experience far-reaching financial burden and wellbeing disparity. Indigenous

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Australians, all things considered, have lower levels of knowledge, business, salary, and more
unfortunate quality lodging than non-Indigenous Australians (Gray & Tesfaghiorghis,
2018).The beginning of socio-political variables adding to the native wellbeing emergency is
mostly ascribed to the recorded impacts of colonization that caused the disintegration of
conventional lifestyles, culture, and self-assurance of the native populace (Macdonald &
Steenbeek, 2015, pp. 32–46). Socio-statistic factors, for example, age, sex, instructive
capabilities and business status, affect the accessibility of the medicinal services benefits just
as the effect of mindfulness among the populace (Thurber et al., 2018, pp. 491-498). In
particular, alcohol abuse and tobacco smoking have been associated with social interferences,
and the weight-related with step by step life may fuel the deed of prosperity peril rehearses,
for instance, tobacco smoking (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2019).For most
Australians, the lives of desert Aboriginal clans in focal Australia are difficult to grasp. The
normal Aboriginal family wins just about 55% of a normal Australian family, US$ 316 seven
days contrasted and US$ 575.
Health Inequities
While numerous parts of Indigenous wellbeing have improved, challenges still exist.
Indigenous Australians have a shorter expectancy than non-Indigenous Australians and are in
any event twice as liable to rate their wellbeing as reasonable or poor (Rosenstock, Mukandi,
Zwi & Hill, 2013, pp. 356-364). Indigenous Australians are bound to report trouble in getting
to reasonable healthcare administrations that are adjacent than non-Indigenous Australians.
The living and working conditions that make up their social condition impact their wellbeing
and prosperity. For the most part, the higher an individual's financial position, the better their
wellbeing. The huge inconsistencies between the strength of Australia's indigenous
Aboriginals and the remainder of the populace are troubling in such a rich nation. Native
neediness is related to social issues, for example, joblessness and high detainment rates. It is

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in this setting the wellbeing results of the Aboriginal populace fall behind the remainder of
Australia. Normal indigenous future is around 60 years for men and 68 for women – a normal
17 years lower than that of the complete populace, as indicated by the Australian Bureau of
Statistics. Australia's 517,200 Aboriginals makeup 2.5% of the populace and are the nation's
most impeded gathering. Their people groups have higher newborn child mortality, and more
medication misuse and liquor addiction, than the remainder of the populace (Moodie,
Tolhurst & Martin, 2016, pp. 223-225). They additionally experience the ill effects of
ailments related to poor living conditions, for example, scabies and pneumonia.
Health Inequalities
The beginning of socio-political variables adding to the native wellbeing emergency
is mostly ascribed to the recorded impacts of colonization that caused the disintegration of
conventional lifestyles, culture, and self-assurance of the native populace (Macdonald &
Steenbeek, 2015, pp. 32–46). A portion of these demonstrations propagated by the frontier
organization whose results influence the present wellbeing circumstance of the natives to
incorporate prejudice, minimization from the general public, separation, and progressing
constrained expulsion of kids from their native families. It has been perceived that relational
associations may propel prosperity peril rehearses, for instance, smoking.
In addition to the issues, the populations of Indigenous in Australia have also been
suffering from different types of abuses and violence. Family violence has been hampering
their culture and the fabric of their societies. The children and women are the major victims
of these forms of family abuses (Segal, Nguyen, Gent, Hampton & Boffa, 2018, pp.
e0208764). Family brutality includes any utilization of power, be it physical or non-physical,
which is planned for controlling another family or network part and which undermines that
individual's prosperity. Family brutality is not constrained to physical types of maltreatment

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and furthermore incorporates social and profound maltreatment. There are interconnecting
and trans-generational encounters of brutality inside Indigenous families and networks.
Native and Torres Strait Islander individuals are somewhere in the range of two and multiple
times almost certain than different Australians to encounter viciousness as unfortunate
casualties or guilty parties (Family violence and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
women, 2019).
Health outcomes of Aboriginals
The differences between the soundness of Indigenous and non-Indigenous populaces
keep on being common inside Australia. Indigenous Australians have a shorter future (10.6
years less for males and 9.5 years less for females) and more terrible welfare results than their
non-Indigenous partners. Seventy percent of the wellbeing hole among Indigenous and non-
Indigenous Australians can be clarified by non-transferable interminable sicknesses, with the
cardiovascular illness being the biggest patron (23%), trailed by diabetes (12%), mental
clutters (10%), and endless respiratory ailment (9%). It is perceived that wellbeing hazard
conduct substantially affects numerous non-transmittable maladies, and Indigenous
Australians all the more every now and again take part in adverse wellbeing hazard practices,
for example, smoking tobacco and abuse of liquor and medications. For instance, in an
ongoing national review, 43.8% of Indigenous Australians were accounted for to be present
every day smokers, contrasted and 15.7% of non-Indigenous Australians("National
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Survey, 2014-15", 2016).
The accurate degree of emotional wellness issues among Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander individuals is unknown, yet there is proof that, as indicated by the 2012-13
Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Survey (AATSIHS), just about 33%
of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander grown-ups revealed feeling high or exceptionally

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large amounts of mental misery in the earlier year ("Face the facts: Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander Peoples", 2015).
One specific health disparity impacting aboriginals
Australian Aboriginals have encountered human services disparities brought about
withdrawal from consideration and deferral in consideration. They are not given need
contrasted with different patients. Because of Indigenous, populaces living with high paces of
endless sickness, access to these administrations is much progressively significant.
Indigenous people groups are frequently kept from getting to these sorts of administrations
because of a scope of hindrances including the surprising expense of human services,
encounters of segregation, bigotry, and poor correspondence with medicinal services experts
(Bastos, Harnois & Paradies, 2018, pp. 209-218; Haynes, Taylor, Durey, Bessarab &
Thompson, 2014, pp. 75). They additionally will, in general, utilize Indigenous staff who
communicate in the neighbourhood language and are frequently known by individuals getting
to the administration. The aboriginals have been involved in increased alcohol abuse and
smoking (Waterworth, Pescud, Braham, Dimmock & Rosenberg, 2015, pp. e0142323). These
habits have detrimental effects on their health. Poor health infrastructure in their region leads
to the increment of these diseases in these populations.
In Australia, the means of access to healthcare depends on factors like location and
distance of the healthcare provider from their area. The number of healthcare service
providers in an area for the population is lesser than the expected one (Davy, Harfield,
McArthur, Munn & Brown, 2016, pp. 163). The socio-economic status of the population has
been decreasing by the year, which makes it difficult for them to approach healthcare systems
and susceptible to suffer from unhygienic conditions and contracting communicable diseases.

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Identifying a target audience to make policy decisions
National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organization is an Aboriginal
health-promoting organization representing the community throughout Australia. A locally
elected board of directors have been a part of the organization to solve the issues that are
being faced by the community in the healthcare sector in Australia. The organization runs a
number of programs to improve the welfare of the community in the country. Some of their
programs include Talking About The Smokes (TATS), Suicide Prevention Strategy and Ear
and Hearing Health Project ("NACCHO", 2019). These programs help in making the
community aware of the detrimental effects their habits will have on their health. This
organization has been carrying out programs regularly to gradually reduce the health
inequities and inequalities faced by the populace. They have an inter-professional team from
the healthcare sector which helps in gathering funds from the government to undertake
awareness programs in the region. The team helps in making the community understand the
importance of health and the ways in which they can be achieved (Morgan, 2015, pp. 188-
189). The funding which has been obtained from the government helps in providing them
with the basic amenities of life. It is the responsibility of the government to implement
policies to reduce the prevalence of unhealthy habits in individuals for the betterment of the
community.
Recommendations for the project
The association of nurses in Australia have come together as a group in providing the
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with the best quality care for the improvement in
health. The nurses help in providing with a culturally sensitive service to the Aboriginals by
improving patient engagement and contributing to closing the gap for the community. The
staffs are trained by expert professionals to reduce the communication barrier with increased

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culture affection among the nurses for these people. This helps in understanding the problems
faced by the community and devising a plan to reduce the prevalence of diseases and
illnesses in them. Nurses conduct education sessions in the form of awareness programs in
the region to make the populace aware of the importance of general hygiene that needs to be
followed to lead a better life. They are taught about the effects of their habits of smoking and
alcohol and their effects on their health as well as their family lives. Mental wellbeing of the
community needs to be addressed by mental health nurses to ensure a better and happier
environment for them to reside in. The nurse should be emotionally connecting with the
patient to make them feel comfortable in sharing their problems and deducing specific
patient-centred care for them. This will ensure in reaching a better health outcome for the
community.
Conclusion (Standard of Practice)
The nurses play a key role in delivering patient-centred care to people who belong
from vulnerable backgrounds. In this case, the Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders have
long been neglected and devoid of accessing primary healthcare service in the country. For
this reason, the nurses with high cultural competency and appropriate communication skills
have been recruited by hospitals to provide the deserved holistic care to its citizens. The
standard 2.2 of the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia suggests that nursing
professionals should effectively communicate with the patient with respect to their differing
culture, belief, values and rights. This helps in the reduction of the likeliness of patients
devoid of the care because of their race, colour or gender. The aboriginals have been devoid
because of their different background than the rest of Australia. The Code of Conduct
specifies the nursing professionals to adhere to the policies enforced by the organization and
the government to each and every citizen of Australia. It is the basic necessity for a person to

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access the healthcare service in the region which is solely dedicated to delivering quality care
to its community. Studies have reported that effective communication between the nurse and
the patient helps in building a therapeutic relationship which helps in reaching a better health
outcome in the expected time. The nurses should ensure building trust with the community so
as to make it easier for the people to approach them in the time of need.

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