Cultural safety is an important foundation for any health service in Australia today and a lot of opportunities exist to improve this particularly for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who have significantly lower health outcomes in the state and country when compared to the general population’s health outcomes.

Through Stefan’s work in the Emergency Department at Cairns and Hinterland HHS, novel approaches and resources have been developed to ensure the access-to-care experience for the aboriginal community is transformed for the better. Moreover, they’ve also been recognized as best practice and adopted by HHSs across the state. This talk will see Stefan share his experience and his work to:

• Develop a workforce strategy that includes indigenous people to improve relatability with marginalized communities
• Get prioritization from across medical, admin and nursing staff to learn about culturally sound practices
• Expand focus to improve experience of suicidal and complex aboriginal patient experiences