Analysis of a Health Project: Social Determinants and Principles

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of a health project, likely focused on improving the health outcomes of an indigenous community. The report identifies and discusses two key social determinants of health, such as the impact of home environments and social isolation, supported by scholarly references and examples from a video case study. It then explores how two primary health care principles, specifically health promotion and access/equity, guided the project's implementation, providing examples from the video and relevant references. Furthermore, the report examines a strategy from the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion, namely strengthening community action, and how it relates to the project's success, again with examples and references. Finally, the report defines cultural competence and explains its importance in the project's success, providing a demonstration from the video and supporting scholarly evidence, emphasizing the significance of culturally sensitive practices in achieving positive health outcomes within the community.

Page1
ASSIGNMENT 2- GUIDED WRITTEN RESPONSE TO CASE STUDY
1) Identify and discuss two social determinants of health that helped to
determine the need for the project. Provide examples from the video and
include at least one scholarly reference for each social determinant.
Healthy child development is one of the globally recognised crucial determinant
of the future health. Healthy child development is a moral responsibility of the
nation and community. Hence families must discuss and undertake the
initiatives to abandon the risk factors that adversely affects the childhood
development such as substance use, domestic violence, child abuse etc.
According to Brettig (2015), the influence of the home environment on social,
emotional and spiritual development is probably even more significant. Parents
may not be the best educators in some other domains but they have a huge
influence on the wellbeing of their children. Likewise, from the video, developed
by the Rural Health Channel (RHC,2014) it was evident that to shape healthy
children, healthy community is required which determined the need for Gnibi
project to develop healthy community. Creating supportive and caring
environments for children and implementation of the activities and learning skills
in the community ensuring optimum growth of children giving them equal
chance to shape themselves into a responsible citizen in the community. The
video also indicates the problem of social isolation which is a key factor in the
development of children as there is no access to the childcare and other early
childhood learning centres where children can find their strongest
representative teachers as role models, learn, explore, play and cherish their
childhood which builds the foundation stone of successful and heathy life. The

Page2
message conveyed in the video shows the importance of nurture and nature
which means nurturing children’s skills and abilities and teaching children to
respect the natural land in which they live and educate holistically. Education
and health literacy is also considered as a fundamental human right and a path
to the promising future but indigenous communities do not have the opportunity
to complete or enter school. The video highlights one of the significant and
serious problem of poverty in the community which stops them from going to
school and leaves them without numeracy and literacy skills. A ladder to come
out of the poverty is education. Education enables people to develop personally,
eradicate poverty by achieving highly paid jobs, high standard of living and
boost socio-economic development in the community. Educating the aboriginal
children based on their cultural values, their relationships, language and
connection to the aboriginal land is required to develop more interest in
education and schools. “Indigenous peoples continue to face challenges in
accessing the education that fully recognises the diversity of the Indigenous
languages and cultures,” said The Australian Human Rights Commission
President, Gillian Triggs. Lack of health literacy and education is determined in
the video which indicates the need for this project as it increases mortality rates,
morbidity and diseases in the aboriginal communities. Health literacy improves
the ability of individual to live a healthy life by making appropriate health
decisions. Health literacy enhances the knowledge of the food security, reduces
malnutrition, maintain health and wellness, improves self-awareness of the
diseases and chronic conditions and plays a key role in accessing additional
health resources resulting in greater efficiency to the health system. Hence
promotion of the health literacy and education reduces suicides and deaths,

Page3
promote gender equality and peace and it is one of the fine investment people
can make in one’s community.
2) Identify and explain how two primary health care principles guided the
project in the video. Provide examples from the video and include at
least one scholarly reference for each principle.
Health Promotion is one of the significant primary health care principle which
directed this project. Aboriginal community presented in the video have been
through anger, trauma, sexual abuse, grief and pain and have come together to
make their community a better place to rejoice. Professor Judy in the project is
trying to support people by holistically bringing together a shattered community
where they make decisions, discuss the issues and find solutions to promote
health and wellness. McPhail-Bell, Bond, Brough and Fredericks (2015) defined
health promotion as a process of “enabling people to increase control over, and
to improve, their health. Health promotion is both a practice and normative ideal
regarding a particular vision of a good society”. Addressing the issues such as
smoking, alcohol consumption, substance use and discussing the risk to
exposure, listening to others, creating awareness and finding solutions to these
problems by engaging seniors, youth, mums and kids. Some of the information
sighted in the video motivate youth to indulge themselves in various self-
development activities like Ian from the community did to develop his learning
skills and likewise also creating new activities for the children which is a good
example of establishing a healthy individual environment. Health promotion that
is culturally responsive, facilitates empowerment of the community, boost
confidence to control the issues and strengthen individual capabilities.

Page4
Furthermore, access and equity was another major primary healthcare principle
that guided the project. Lack of access and equity in the services and resources
is the major longstanding issue in remote communities. The video shows that
there is Inadequate use of the human resources due to the barriers such as
distance, affordability, lack of knowledge leads to ill health in communities.
Access to education, social support groups, hospitals, women’s groups,
Community centres is vital for women to gain significant support and prenatal,
postnatal information to foster the children and support throughout their
pregnancy resulting into reduction of mortality rates and improvement of
maternal health. Employment opportunities in the remote areas is zero due to
low level of education. Hence they have a very low standard of living, lack of
housing and sanitisation, poor nutrition and increase in the number of crimes
and offence. “It is suggested that the goal of equity is to create conditions that
allow all to participate and prosper. In short, equity creates a path from hope to
change” (Heymann and Barrera, 2014). Equity provides a chance to bring a
change in the history of aboriginal children to access the educational and other
recreational facilities and transform into a strong individual and provide a
culturally responsive education to nourish the future generations which can be
best done by their community members itself. Hence to keep the education
sustainable to the future children it is necessary to build a healthy and smart
community. It will also reduce the child abuse, domestic violence, sexual
assault suicidal rates and gambling which in turn will transform into a caring and
supportive community. Despite of these complex issues, some of the social
environmental factors such as community participation, level of trust and
anxiety, unorganised setting, control over the social factors, efficiency and low

Page5
empowerment breaks the cycle of delivery of resources to the indigenous
communities.
3) Identify and discuss one strategy from the Ottawa Charter for Health
Promotion that relates to the project in the video. Provide at least one
example from the video and include at least one scholarly reference.
Strengthen Community action is the strategy from Ottawa Charter that supports
the project in the video. The key role of this strategy is to empower the
community and achieve self-control, decision making power and learn to
stabilise actions. The engagement of the community by sharing their feelings
and thoughts on the issues, finding solutions, addressing current issues and be
open and developing a trustworthy relationship is a good example of health
promotion from the project in the video. This demonstrates the potential of
building community capacity and involving the participation of the people to take
actions to reach their target. At some point, in this process the transformation
takes place resulting into the empowerment of the community and
strengthening their bond. A men’s group is also mentioned in the video which is
essential to identify the issues, encouraging involvement of men’s group in
sports and other activities to achieve greater sustainability and motivate them to
work together to implement actions. Minister Bishop (2006) stated that, Schools
and communities in remote and regional areas will have the opportunity to
participate in the community-based music, dance, art and career activities
designed for both the Indigenous and non-Indigenous young people. “Positive
events such as these provide an important mechanism for increasing
community involvement in building the resilience of young people”. There is a

Page6
need to increase the culture focused learning activities to boost the social
capital and receive optimum health outcomes. Support networks and groups
can help to provide a safe and healthy environment for the children and also
help the parents to love, care and support their children to build a strong
community.
4) Define cultural competence and discuss why it is important
in determining the success of the project. Provide at least one example
from the video where this concept is demonstrated and at least one
scholarly reference.
Cultural competence is the core component to enhance the ability of the service
providers and to ethically participate in the ongoing integral process of making a
reasonable and respectful choices and being aware of the cultural knowledge,
values and skills to communicate and collaborate effectively in cross-cultural
circumstances. Cultural competency is defined as "creating a health care
environment that is free of racism and stereotypes, where Aboriginal people are
treated with empathy, dignity and respect," and culturally safe care includes
building trust, recognizing the role of socioeconomic conditions, communicating
respect for patient beliefs and ensuring patients are partners in decisions about
their health.( O'Sullivan, 2013).Cultural competency is important as it reduces
inequalities and increases the access to health care facilities by eliminating the
barriers such as trust, language barrier, patient misunderstanding, poor
knowledge of treatment and also improves health disparities. The activities or
initiatives practised considering cultural competency lead to more effective
outcomes, openness, increased level of knowledge and awareness. Hence there

Page7
is a need for Aboriginal cultural values and beliefs to be an important part of the
professional education and training of the health professionals to deliver the best
results. The healing circle of Gnibi drawn with the holy water under the mango
tree symbolises the love for nature and land by aboriginal community, solving
problems by promoting aboriginal culture in the form of dance, art, music and
painting in the project is the best example of cultural competency, to start the
community gathering holistically represents the purity and strong bond of culture
which helps in developing trust and confidence, increase openness and the
circle stands for education, sharing ideas, development and learning. The video
and Research proves that Cultural competency can yield best outcomes through
a healthy partnership and respectful relationships leading to stable, healthy and
happy life of aboriginal people.

Page8
References
Rural Health Channel. (2014, January 15). It takes a village [video
file].Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcXGuq_k2K8
McPhail‐Bell, K., Bond, C., Brough, M., & Fredericks, B. (2015). ‘We don't tell
people what to do’: Ethical practice and Indigenous health promotion.
Health Promotion Journal of Australia, 26(3), 195-196. doi:
10.1071/HE15048
Heymann, J., & Barrera, Magda. (2014). Ensuring a sustainable future: Making
progress on environment and equity. USA: Oxford University Press.
Brettig, K., & Children Communities Connections Learning Network, editor.
(2015). Building stronger communities with children and families.
Newcastle upon Tyne, England: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Australian Human Rights Commission (2016, August 9). Education focus for
worlds indigenous peoples. Retrieved from

Page9
https://www.humanrights.gov.au/about/news/education-focus-worlds-indigenous-
peoples
Strengthening Indigenous communities: Community festivals for drug
prevention, Education.(2006).US Fed News Service, Including Us State
News. Retrieved from
https://west-sydney-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/primo-explore/fulldisplay?
docid=TN_proquest469981095&context=PC&vid=UWS-
ALMA&lang=en_US&search_scope=default_scope&adaptor=primo_central_multiple_f
e&tab=default_tab&query=any,contains,imporatnce%20of%20education%20in
%20indigenous%20community&facet=rtype,include,newspaper_articles&offset=0
O'Sullivan, Bonnie. (2013). Considering culture in aboriginal care. CMAJ:
Canadian Medical Association Journal, 185(1), E27-8.doi:
10.1503/cmaj.109-4376