This is our third rolling report from the #CommunityControl Twitter Festival that is spotlighting the work of Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services in tobacco control, on World Tobacco Day (read the first one here and the second one here).
The Festival is sponsored by the Aboriginal Health and Medical Research Council of NSW (AH&MRC) and hosted by Croakey Professional Services. The moderators are Amy McQuire, Dr Tim Senior and Hayley McQuire. Bookmark this link to follow the rolling posts.
Empowering Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women to be smoke-free during pregnancy
Aboriginal people are motivated to quit. AIHW reported Aboriginal people are more likely to make a quit attempt (39%) than other Australians (30%),
Ngidhi yinaaru nhal yayi (this woman told me): Often health providers advising #reduction rather than #quitting during pregnancy. Aboriginal women are following this advice.
Ngidhi yinaaru nhal yayi (this woman told me): Aboriginal women want more specific health information. “Is there information on tiny babies? Because you hear about it but what does it mean?”
Durany-ga-rra (deliver a message): We need to make our #Healthpromotion specific. Even #lowconsumption affects LBW of babies. LBW has associations with our shortened life expectancy.
Introducing co-moderator Hayley McQuire
Let me also share this deadly webinar held on WNTD last by @IAHA_National with Prof. Tom Calma AO, the National Coordinator Tackling Indigenous Smoking. Check it out here:
Ready Mob
Galambila Aboriginal Medical Service
The Tackling Indigenous Smoking program team Ready Mob is a federally funded program based out of Galambila Aboriginal Health Service in Coffs Harbour, covering the Mid North Coast region from Coffs Harbour through to Port Macquarie.
My name is Kristy Pursch and my ancestral ties are to the Butchulla people of Fraser Island in Queensland. I have lived in NSW for the past 20 years and brought my children up in beautiful Gumbaynggirr country for the past 14 years.
Ready Mob is an acronym for Really Evaluate and Decide Yourself, Make Ourselves Better which is all about self determination, we don’t tell our mob what to do we just provide the tools and education so that people can make their own informed decisions.
Our strategy to work in and with our local communities is to use local places and local faces. Our relationships in communities are paramount to our effectiveness as a health promotion program.
There are 8 people in our team and all are Aboriginal people with the majority working within their own ancestral lands. This connection and investment in our own local people is integral at ensuring our approach is both determined by and effective for our local mob.
Second and third hand smoke causes just as much damage to small lungs as smoking resulting in more acute respiratory infections, severe asthma attacks and can cause middle infections.
Encouraging our smokers to ‘take a look around and see, who are you sharing your smoke with?’ A non shame based campaign encouraging introspection and positive decision making especially around the impacts smoking causes to those around you.
As with all our campaigns the call to action is to seek quit support by calling the Quitline or visiting your GP and local Aboriginal Medical Service.
Riverina Medical and Dental Aboriginal Corporation
AH&MRC tweeting live from RivMed: Celebrating success in tobacco control initiatives in the Riverina region NSW
iSISTAQUIT
Dr Gillian Gould: Successes in reducing the incidence of smoking during pregnancy
Tweeting from Gumbaynggirr country in Coffs Harbour, I’m a GP researcher developing Indigenous smoking cessation strategies for the last 14 years – invited by #communitycontrol to do this work
#iSISTAQUIT is a brand new program funded by Dept of Health @healthgovau & @TIS. We will roll-out @sistaquit to more services across Australia in 2020. Wow thanks DOH and TIS! New on-line training available.
Our new #iSISTAQUIT centre in Coffs Harbour will support excellence in #regional #research @UONresearch we are seeking three full-time researchers (as many as possible to be Indigenous) and offering Indigenous PhD scholarship – get in touch.
A GP’s perspective
Dr Tim Senior
And working in #communitycontrol means they know the service is set up for them, and they have friends and relatives employed there and on the board! And we have staff and programs that will help.
So for example, I have access to free nicotine replacement, as well as the medicines on the PBS. And especially important are our health workers and our mums and bubs and social and emotional wellebeing programs. And dentists.
Fundamentally, my goal as a GP in #CommunityControl is to enable people to make decisions about their life, NOT tell people what to do. (We’ve tried that for >200 yrs. It doesn’t work!)
And having a relationship with a patient, means the discussion we have can be very practical.
I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t know that smoking is bad for them. But stress, poverty, boredom, habit, socialising underscored by addiction are all reasons people continue to smoke.
We can offer practical advice for all of these things, in complete confidence, with onward referral as appropriate
FYI, these are the smoking cessation guidelines.
Live from Redfern
@ahmrc tweeted from the Redfern Aboriginal Medical Service and their World No Tobacco Day Community Event.
Sharing stories and resources
Wrapping It Up
Amy McQuire
Hayley McQuire
Thanks
Twitter Analytics
During the period when Croakey was publishing about the Twitter Festival (13 May-3 June 2019), 299 Twitter accounts sent more than 2,000 tweets using the #CommunityControl hashtag, creating more than 17 million Twitter impressions.
See the Symplur Analytics here, and the Twitter transcript here.
As well as trending nationally at the hashtags #CommunityControl and #YourHealthYourFuture, some participants also brought the discussions into the #WorldNoTobaccoDay discussions, which also trended nationally.
• The Twitter festival was hosted by Croakey Professional Services on behalf of the AH&MRC. We thank the AH&MRC for organising the program. Bookmark this link for the series of articles.
