Dialogue between National and state-wide entities enables relevant alliances and ensures alignment between frameworks. In the context of cultural responsiveness, this dialogue allows possibilities for messages to be amplified, as an example, Embrace Australia and Victorian Transcultural Mental Health (VTMH) inform each other and consult with each other about cultural responsiveness strategies in the national and state-wide context.
Support in the Victorian context
VTMH supports public mental health service providers to go through a reform of their own organisation. In the context of the ‘VTMH Partners in Diversity Program’, the Partnership Framework was designed to facilitate discussions between VTMH and services, to document the services perception of their strength and gaps, to develop organisational goals and to identify how VTMH can assist the organisation to meet their goals.
The VTMH partnership planning framework is relational and aims at enabling educating processes, thinking spaces, broad perspectives, negotiations and co-construction of goals through guided conversations. It is a fluid, dynamic and changing relationship that evolves between VTMH and the partner service supported by the ongoing use of the partnership planning framework.
The VTMH Cultural Responsiveness Partnership Planning Framework was originally adapted from and informed by the domains, standards and measures outlined in the Victorian Government DoH (2009) Cultural Responsiveness Framework: Guidelines for Victorian Health Services.
The VTMH Cultural Responsiveness Partnership Planning Framework is in alignment with the Victorian Mental Health and Wellbeing Workforce Capability Framework (2021) and Victoria’s Mental Health and Wellbeing Workforce Strategy 2021- 2024.
VTMH is here to support public mental health organisations to identify strengths and gaps in cultural responsiveness and put together a plan to sustain positive change.
Support in the National context
The Embrace Multicultural Mental Health Project offers a nationally available online resource which allows mental health organisations and individual practitioners to evaluate and enhance their cultural responsiveness. It is mapped against national standards to help organisations meet their existing requirements, and provides free access to a wide range of support and resources. Public mental health services and practitioners in Victoria can undertake this online assessment (evaluation), and develop an action plan to support organisational improvement in cultural capacity.
If you have any questions, the Embrace team is available to provide advice in this process. The Embrace Framework for Mental Health in Multicultural Australia can be found here: https://embracementalhealth.org.au/service-providers/framework-landing.
If after going through the Embrace Framework, public mental health services in Victoria would like to continue expanding their knowledge, practice, and reflections on cultural responsiveness, they are welcome to contact VTMH which is the Victorian State-wide Transcultural Mental Health Service who supports the Victorian mental health sector to build their capacity on cultural responsiveness.
