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Waitemata District Health Board's commitment to serving it's growing Asian population and responsiveness to the Asian Community needs has led to the development of the Asian Health Support Service.
The service started off as a pilot project in 1999 exploring the health needs of Asian people within the Waitemata District. The surveys of Asian people and health professionals in North and West Auckland was published and launched in March 2001 (Ngai et al; 2001). For more information about the pilot, please click
HERE.
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 Definitions of commonly used terms
Ethnic refers to the group of people whose ethnic heritage distinguishes them from the majority of other people in NZ, including Maori and Pacific people. The term includes people from well established ethnic communities, recent migrants, refugees and those people born in NZ who identify with their ethnic heritage. Ethnic group affiliation is self-determined. Ethnicity is a broad concept that includes elements of race, language, religion, customs and traditions as well as geographic, tribal or national identity. (Office of Ethnic Affairs, Ethnic Perspectives Policy, 2003)
Asian is commonly referred to as people who comes from Asia, including people coming from West Asia eg Afghanistan, Nepal, to South Asia, covering the Indian sub-continent, East Asia covering China, North and South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and South East Asia, consisting of countries like Singapore, Malaysia, Phillipines, Vietnam, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and Kampuchea (Statistics NZ 1995, 1999, 2003). See map below.
Barriers to accessing healthcare perceived by overall migrants and
refugees include:
Little
knowledge of NZ healthcare system, services and entitlements
Language and
/ or literacy barriers; insufficient interpreting services; discourages
their utilisation of primary health system
Lack of
cultural awareness of health providers; which impact on the service
delivery and practice on the health of migrants and refugees; some
migrants and refugees have expectations and health seeking patterns
different from common norms in NZ
Stigma
associated with mental health prevents individuals and family members of
migrants and refugees assessing appropriate assessment and treatment
services
Financial
barriers, cost of consultation fees, medicine and travel (poor public
transport systems), especially impact on refugees with minimal assets
and have more complex health needs requiring them to have access to a
range of health services
Why
do we need to address Asian, migrant and refugee health needs?
Waitemata DHB’s Health Gain and Service Improvement Priorities,
2005 considered addressing health inequalities as a priority area stated
that in order to achieve this,
health services should be accessible, culturally appropriate and safe to
meet the healthcare needs of the population, including Asian people,
migrants and refugees.
Ministry of
Health DHB Operations Policy Framework 2006-2007 requires all DHB’s to
consider Ethnic peoples
Under the
National and Regional Mental Health Strategies
Under the
Auckland Regional Settlement Strategy
Legislation
and Acts required
Growing
migrant population demand
Growing
number of culturally and linguistically diverse migrant population and
increasing utilisation of interpreting services.
For more
information about
migrant and refugee health needs,
please click
HERE.
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