After a plea not to be distracted by the view over Ballina’s Lighthouse Beach, 41 young people from the Northern Rivers convened in late September to share their opinions about local health care with representatives of the NSW Health Ministry.
Participants were asked not to pull punches when discussing five key topics - Health and Health Issues, Access to Services, Service Providers, Diversity and Youth Participation and Health Promotion and Online Services/Resources.
On hand to assist the process were two senior officers from the Ministry’s Youth Health & Wellbeing Team, Dr Sally Gibson and Dr Carmen Jarrett, with other adults assisting as facilitators and scribes.
Four key themes emerged from the topic, Health and Health Issues: Being Healthy, Social Connection, Mental Health and Drugs and Alcohol. Discussion included a general feeling of stigma against youth, i.e. all youth are lazy, a need for sexual health education, and too much time spent in front of computer/phone screens, including cyber bullying.
Access to Services generated discussion around transport problems, confidentiality, stigma, choice, information access, support and affordability, and the broad issue of rurality.
Service Providers drew comments about health professionals, mostly positive, with an emphasis on the need for doctors to be open and not judgmental, use simple language and explain things, and allow young people to make decisions.
Preference was expressed for seeing the same health professional whom they can build relationships with, while many felt seeing a doctor of the same gender is a more comfortable option.
The meeting made a recommendation for health professionals to develop succinct bio-data, perhaps via an app, to provide information about youth friendliness, specialisations, and attitudes about cultural, spiritual, sexual and personal situations.
On Diversity and Youth Participation, a wide range of issues were raised, including the grief and sorrow Indigenous youth often carry from their elders, a lack of adult role models, transgender issues, the need for better mental health support, and communication problems.
The Health Promotion and Online Services/Resources session discussed social media, making health promotion campaigns more effective, involving young people in youth health planning, and using youth advocates and spokespeople.
A closing statement endorsed by participants said “many felt pleasantly surprised by the format of the day, and this type of forum was invaluable and an ideal situation because young people shared experiences and engaged and interacted in a group through discussion.”
“Up to 20 per cent of young people has one or more chronic conditions (excluding mental health issues), and two per cent has a disability…”
The day was aimed at getting direct input from a regional sampling of the state’s 1.26 million young people about the easy of accessing care and advice from GPs, community health and hospitals, and what providers might be able to learn from hearing their views.
It was one of two held in NSW, the first in Parramatta a week earlier when 120 urban participants discussed what aspects of health care they felt were working and which might be improved.
Young people are defined as being in the 12 to 24 years bracket, the so-called ‘second decade’ of life that WHO and other bodies see as crucial to improving the health of the overall community.
While statistics show that 86 per cent of this cohort in Australia believes themselves to be well, up to 20 per cent has one or more chronic conditions (excluding mental health issues), and two per cent has a disability.
Clearly more work needs to be done in the area of mental health, given the unacceptably high youth suicide rates, and emotional wellbeing was a commonly raised issue in the forum.
Other matters were the uncertainty some young people have about bulk billing - they are entitled to their own Medicare card from the age of 15 - and privacy requirements by health care providers. Pocket reference cards are now available on both topics.
The NSW Youth Health Policy 2011-2016 is in the process of being updated via this consultation process, guided by a discussion paper, Towards the Next Youth Health Policy.
An emergent theme from the Ballina and Parramatta sessions has been the need for clinicians to listen more carefully and less judgmentally to their youthful patients/clients, and help them to acquire knowledge that will enable better informed decisions about their health care.
The organisers said the forum’s key message was that youth have specific health needs and often face barriers and are placed in vulnerable situations when using health services.
“They have a voice which needs to be heard. Youth want to see more youth friendly services and be encouraged to have better health outcomes through positive relationships with health professionals... Early intervention through supportive resources that reach all youth, such as education and mentoring, will help achieve confidence and provide better health outcomes.”
The event was supported by the Northern NSW Local Health District, the North Coast Primary Health Network, Social Futures, Headspace, and North Coast TAFE.
