Highlighting Indigenous family parenting resource at Australasian Conference
A free parenting resource for health professionals supporting Indigenous families across Australia and around the world will be highlighted at this week’s biennial Australasian Marce Society for Perinatal Mental Health Conference hosted in Perth.
11 Oct 2019
11 October 2019
Raphael Services’ National Project Officer Jane Leung and Raphael Services’ Senior Project Officer Jane Doyle will deliver the presentation about the Connected Parenting eLearning resource which was designed to support health workers and health professionals working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islands families to:
- explore the relevance of attachment-based parenting for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents
- facilitate the sharing of this knowledge with families
- facilitate conversations with parents and carers to identify supports available to assist them in their parenting role
- support parents to be the best parents that they can be in order for their children to achieve their full potential.
The Marce conference, sponsored by St John of God Raphael Services, aims to increase the understanding, prevention and treatment of mental illness related to childbearing among clinicians and the wider community.
This year’s theme is Love and Fear: Becoming a person within a family, and will explore sub-themes including the impact of trauma, the birth experience and pre-conception influences, among others.
The resource has also piqued the interest of professionals working with First Nation communities in Canada and the United States and is being applied by other organisations including the Telethon Kids Institute, Sydney Children’s Hospital and Mallee Aboriginal Health Service in Victoria.
The Connected Parenting eLearning resource which was developed by St John of God Social Outreach and the WA Child and Adolescent Community Health, and supported by the WA Mental Health Commission, has already been accessed by 300 people since its launch in February 2019.
Feedback from participants shows that the resource is supporting a shift in knowledge and confidence among participants working with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families to promote secure attachment as well as social and emotional development.