Cultural safety training for allied health students in Australia

Abstract

Culturally safe health practitioners are essential for effective service provision to culturally diverse populations, including Indigenous Australians. Therefore, cultural safety education during training as a health care professional is an essential component in helping improve the health of Indigenous Australians. This study examined whether the implementation of an Indigenous cultural safety education workshop increased self-rated cultural safety knowledge and attitudes of allied health students. The study employed a quantitative before-and-after design using pre- and post-surveys to determine the level of attitudinal change in students who attended a day long workshop. The study sample consisted of 1st year (n = 347) and 4th year (n = 149) allied health students at a regional Australian university over the years 2007–2011. Whilst the results of this current study are varied in terms of achieving positive change across all of the taught items of knowledge and attitude, they provide some evidence around the value of this type of curriculum intervention in helping develop culturally safe practitioners. An important finding was around the student's becoming self-aware about their own values and cultural identity, combined with acknowledging the importance of this cultural identity to interactions with clients. This form of ‘cultural humility’ appears to be an important step to becoming a culturally safe practitioner. These types of interventions would be enhanced through embedding and scaffolding throughout the curricula.

Marŋgithirri guŋga’yunarawu ga guŋga’yunyarawu marŋgithinyarawu Learning to connect and connecting to learn: Preparing the rural and remote allied health workforce through a co‐created student‐implemented service in East Arnhem, Australia

“…It is unclear what elements of the learning experience were most influential in the transformation, which is a question for future design of student‐implemented services. Did this transformation occur because a strong foundation had been laid with cultural awareness training 4 and Indigenous knowledge 13 embedded into their pre‐clinical undergraduate curriculum? Was it because students felt valued when providing a service that would not otherwise exist 1 ?…”

“…Student‐implemented allied health services in rural and remote Australia provide clinical placements for allied health students, and at the same time offer services that would otherwise not exist 1‐4 . Such services are valuable in rural and remote locations where allied health services are scarce and fluctuating 5 due to underinvestment 6 and difficulties in recruitment and retention 7 .…”

“…Allied health student clinical placements provide students with clinical experiences that enable them to meet the requirements of their respective professional bodies 11 . Accordingly, placements must enable students to demonstrate competency in the technical skills of their profession and in applying those skills to provide a high‐quality, culturally responsive and safe service, in a range of service settings 4 . Clinical placements in remote Aboriginal communities can be a challenge for students particularly for those who have never lived, worked or had social connections with an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander community 12 .…”

“…Student-implemented allied health services in rural and remote Australia provide clinical placements for allied health students, and at the same time offer services that would otherwise not exist. [1][2][3][4] Such services are valuable in rural and remote locations where allied health services are scarce and fluctuating 5 due to underinvestment 6 and difficulties in recruitment and retention. 7 Student-implemented services also provide the flexibility to move away from traditional models, to innovative and responsive models of service delivery, to meet the unique needs of remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.…”

“…11 Accordingly, placements must enable students to demonstrate competency in the technical skills of their profession and in applying those skills to provide a high-quality, culturally responsive and safe service, in a range of service settings. 4 Clinical placements in remote Aboriginal communities can be a challenge for students particularly for those who have never lived, worked or had social connections with an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander community. 12 While culturally safe practice 4 and Indigenous knowledges 13 are increasingly embedded in allied health curriculum and professional body requirements, 14,15 how students learn culturally safe and responsive practice in a real-world setting within student-implemented services needs further exploration.…”