Forays in to Aboriginal Health
Forays in to Aboriginal Health
Dr John Boully, a General Practitioner with an avid interest in aboriginal health, delivered our second Port and Talk for 2010. Dr Boully came to St Mark's from Port Augusta to study Medicine at Adelaide University. In his final year of study, he chose to take one of his electives in Ceduna where he worked on his own in an aboriginal community and was challenged by the huge range and diversity of cases that he was expected to treat.
As Dr Boully began his career in medicine, he quickly became involved in the establishment and management of Aboriginal Health Centres in remote outposts in South Australia and New South Wales.
Dr Boully spoke passionately and vividly about the importance of primary healthcare in Aboriginal health. He is particularly interested in the prevalence of nasal, throat and chest infections that are endemic in aboriginal communities. He is very keen to initiate medical research that would explore links between these infections and other systems of the body as well as social factors including family environment and education. Dr Boully said that many aboriginal communities were lacking in their access to primary healthcare and that through the provision of Aboriginal Health Centres with qualified medical staff, the health of aboriginal people could be improved significantly.
Dr Boully described the fragmented nature of the planning and management systems in Aboriginal Health. He attributed the lack of communication between the stakeholders in the field as being responsible for the failure to address the gap between the healthcare of indigenous and non-indigenous Australians. The inability to identify and treat medical conditions such as Otitis Media and Upper Respiratory Tract infections in aboriginal communities is also a consequence of the inefficient management programs that are currently in place.
Throughout his presentation, Dr Boully argued with a sense of urgency that there are many opportunities and challenges waiting to be grasped and addressed not only for people to work in Aboriginal Health Centres throughout Australia but also in the administration and research fields. The night concluded with questions from the audience which highlighted Dr Boully's experiences in aboriginal health and in general medicine. The evening will undoubtedly stimulate some spirited debate in the coming days around College.
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