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Abbreviations

  • AANSW: Aboriginal Affairs NSW
  • ACCO: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Community Controlled Organisation
  • ACCHO: Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation
  • AH&MRC:Aboriginal Health and Medical Research Council of NSW
  • AHW: Aboriginal Health Worker
  • AHP: Aboriginal Health Practitioner
  • ALO: Aboriginal Liaison Officer
  • AMS: Aboriginal Medical Service
  • CAPO: NSW Coalition of Aboriginal Peak Organisations
  • CAH: Centre for Aboriginal Health
  • CSP: Clinical Services Planning
  • CTG: Closing the Gap
  • LDM: Local Decision Making
  • LGA: Local Government Areas
  • LHD: Local Health Districts
  • KPI: Key Performance Indicator
  • MoH: Ministry of Health
  • CTG: National Agreement on Closing the Gap
  • NSQHS: National Safety and Quality Health Service
  • SGO: Stolen Generations Organisation
  • SHN: Speciality Health Network

Glossary

Aboriginal Cultural Engagement Self- Assessment Audit Tool

The Aboriginal Cultural Engagement Self-Assessment Audit Tool is an annual continuous quality improvement mechanism that LHDs to quantify, monitor and improve the cultural and clinical safety of their facilities and services for Aboriginal patients. The tool aims to identify ways of strengthening cultural engagement between staff and their Aboriginal stakeholders by bringing a continuous quality improvement cycle to cultural engagement. The tool provides evidence during hospital accreditation, supports other local and organisational audits and activities developed to strengthen the cultural safety of NSW Health services. The tool embeds the six specific Aboriginal actions from the NSQHSS, the five strategic directions from the NSW Aboriginal Health Plan, the Priority Reform Areas from CTG and the principles of the framework.

Boards

Each Local Health District Board or Specialty Health Network Board is responsible for establishing and oversighting an effective governance and risk management framework for the network, setting its strategic directions, ensuring high standards of professional and ethical conduct are maintained, involving providers and the community in decisions that affect them, monitoring the service delivery and financial performance of the network against its targets and holding the network chief executive accountable for their performance.

Clinical governance

In the context of NSW Health, clinical governance is the set of relationships and responsibilities established by a health service between Ministry of Health, Clinical Excellence Commission, Governing Board, executive, clinicians, health care workers, patients, health consumers, and other stakeholders to ensure good clinical outcomes. Implementation of a sound clinical governance system involves contributions by individuals and teams at all levels of the organisation.

Co-creation

Co-creation differs from co-design, as it allows people to collaboratively identify problems, which extends on co-design where issues are already pre-defined and on co-production where both problems and solutions are pre-defined14.

Commercial determinants of health

The commercial determinants of health are private sector activities affecting people’s health, directly or indirectly, positively or negatively. Commercial activities by private sector organisations shape the physical and social environments in which people live and work, and are a key determinant of Aboriginal peoples’ and communities’ health and wellbeing15.

Cultural determinants of health

The cultural determinants of health are anchored in Aboriginal ways of knowing, being and doing, centred upon the relationship of self to Country, kin, community, and spirituality. They are rights-based, as they hinge upon the inherent right to practice one’s Aboriginal culture, including through: connection to Country, family, kin and community; Aboriginal beliefs and knowledge; cultural expression and continuity; Aboriginal language; and self-determination and leadership.

Cultural load

Cultural load is a term to describe the (often invisible) load borne by Aboriginal people in the workplace, where they are either the only person or one of a small number of people from the Aboriginal community. This creates additional workload associated with things like being consistently expected to respond to all things relating to that community and speak on behalf of all its people. It can mean frequently having to provide information, knowledge, education and support on Aboriginal issues, topics and days of significance –often without any formally agreed reduction or alteration to, or acknowledgement of, a person’s current workload10.

Cultural safety

Cultural safety is an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander specific concept in Australia. It is an experience that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have and its presence or absence can only be determined by them . A culturally safe environment for First Nations people is when their presence is welcomed and respected, experiences are believed and validated, cultures are centred and valued, knowledges and skills are recognised and supported, advice is listened to and acted upon and they do not experience racism in any form. Culturally safe care and services do not discriminate, are respectful, safe and enable meaningful communication and shared decision making. Cultural safety is defined by the individual interacting with the system and receiving care16.

Health equity

Health equity is ‘the absence of unfair, avoidable or remediable differences among groups of people, whether those groups are defined socially, economically, demographically, geographically or by other dimensions of inequality (e.g., sex, gender, ethnicity, disability, or sexual orientation)’ and can be achieved when everyone can attain their full potential for health and wellbeing17.

Health Service

A Local Health District or a statutory health corporation, NSW Ambulance and affiliated health organisations that provide clinical services. NSW Health support organisations that provide clinical services including Cancer Institute NSW.

Health system in NSW

The health system in NSW refers to all health organisations across the state combined. This includes the public health services of NSW Health, private Health Services (primary care, hospitals, medical specialists and allied health), Aboriginal Community Controlled health services and mainstream primary care services.

NSW Health

NSW Health organisations consist of:

  • the Ministry of Health
  • Local Health Districts (LHDs)
  • Specialty Health Networks (SHNs)
  • five state-wide ‘pillar’ organisations focusing on research, data, innovation, clinical excellence, education and training
  • six state-wide or specialist health services that deliver specific types of healthcare, such as emergency ambulance services or pathology, and health system supports, such as infrastructure investment and digital/information technology capabilities.

Self-Determination

Self-Determination is the human right of Indigenous people to control their own affairs and make meaningful decisions about their lives to fulfil their physical, emotional, cultural, spiritual, political, and economic needs .

Social determinants of health

Social determinants of health refer to the material conditions of people’s lives that are shaped by structures beyond their personal control19. They are non-medical factors that influence health outcomes. For Aboriginal peoples, racism is a social determinant of health in addition to those commonly acknowledged by the World Health Organization, such as income, education, employment, job security, housing, food security, early childhood development, transport and social support and exclusion18.

Shared decision making

Decision-making is shared between government and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Shared decision-making is:

  1. by consensus, where the voices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parties hold as much weight as the governments
  2. transparent, where matters for decision are in terms that are easily understood by all parties and where there is enough information and time to understand the implications of the decision
  3. where Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander representatives can speak without fear of reprisals or repercussions
  4. where a wide variety of groups of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, including women, young people, Elders, and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with a disability can have their voice heard
  5. where self-determination is supported, and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander lived experience is understood and respected
  6. where relevant funding for programs and services align with jointly agreed community priorities, noting governments retain responsibility for funding decisions
  7. where partnership parties have access to the same data and information, in an easily accessible format, on which any decisions are made20.
Current as at: Friday 27 September 2024
Contact page owner: Centre for Aboriginal Health