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A culturally safe & responsive mental health system: ECCV & VTMH joint recommendations

The impact of the failures of the state’s mental health system on the mental health and wellbeing of Victoria’s migrant and refugee communities and recommendations for a transformed, culturally responsive mental health system are outlined in a new paper released today.

Produced by the Ethnic Communities’ Council of Victoria [ECCV], in partnership with Victorian Transcultural Mental Health [VTMH], the Recommendations for a Culturally Responsive Mental Health System paper sets out how the mental health reforms underway in Victoria could also lead to better mental health services and outcomes for people from migrant and refugee backgrounds.

It outlines key considerations for a mental health system that supports the needs of a diverse community and that is culturally safe, culturally responsive, equitable and inclusive for all members of the community.

The paper was commissioned by the Victorian Government, Department of Health to identify ways the mental health system in Victoria can increase its cultural responsiveness and improve access to mental health services for people from migrant and refugee backgrounds.

The implementation of the ECCV-VTMH report’s recommendations will help build a more contemporary, effective and culturally responsive approach to mental health reform in Victoria.

The paper regards human rights-based and intersectional approaches as integral to mental healthcare. This involves addressing the systemic barriers that lead to discrimination and exclusion as well as engaging diverse communities as partners.

It also calls for partnerships with multicultural services, ethno-specific community organisations and people with lived experience to overcome the many barriers that prevent people from migrant and refugee backgrounds from accessing support.

Key recommendations include:

  • Developing and applying a strengths-based model to engage with migrant and refugee communities to draw upon their lived experiences of community mobilisation and mutual support
  • Ensuring all decision-making bodies are representative of the diversity of the community
  • Developing the capability of the mental health workforce to deliver culturally safe and responsive care and ensuring services are more representative of the cultural diversity of the community
  • Building partnerships with people with lived experience, ethno-cultural and multicultural organisations, community leaders and advocates to design and deliver mental health services
  • Improving access to professional interpreters who are mental health trained

Download the media release here

Download the full report here

Exploring intersectionality

Thinkers, practitioners, storytellers and researchers from across Australia got together in September to talk about how to apply an intersectional lens. Silvana Izzo from VTMH joined this inaugural session, initiated by Professor Olena Hankivsky, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne. 

Professor Hankivsky, respected expert in intersectionality, is Chair of Women’s Health and Director of the Centre for Health Equity Gender and Women’s Health Unit. We’ve been exploring her body of work, here at VTMH, for the past five years, thinking through the implications and playing our part in applying an intersectional framework to public mental health practice. 

Find out more about VMTH’s work in this area and follow links to resources, including Professor Hankivsky’s work on COVID-19 and intersectionality, here.

Did you catch our September webinar, ‘Community voices: Cultural safety in the times of COVID-19?’

The pandemic has cast a light on the many unaddressed systemic issues affecting for communities living in public housing in inner city Melbourne. This session discussed the mental health implications, innovative community-led responses and the kinds of action government and services still need to take, with communities as partners.

The webinar featured respected therapists, community volunteers and advocates. It was collaboratively developed with the panelists and facilitated by VTMH’s Shehani De Silva.

Links to community projects, background reading plus a recording of the session are now available.

Follow this link for event information and to watch the video

VTMH at Royal Commission hearings

Adriana Mendoza, VTMH Manager, appeared at the Commission on Thursday, 18 July, 2019 as part of a session that considered how the mental health system engages with, recognises and responds to the needs of diverse communities, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer people; and people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.