Speakers
The second CSANZ Indigenous Cardiovascular Health Conference promises to provide an exceptional platform for combining political, social and medical expertise to address the significant life expectancy gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples in Australia and New Zealand.
This conference has as its focus inequities in cardiovascular health care and outcomes among the Indigenous peoples of Australia and New Zealand. Sessions include invited presentations, workshops and poster presentations. Presentations and discussions will develop the detailed policy recommendations of the inaugural conference and apply these to health care delivery.
We are very excited about the potential of this scientific program to improve health care for our Indigenous populations. Please join us for what should be a landmark conference.
Keynote Speakers
Invited Speakers
Dr Kue Young
Dr Kue Young was born in Hong Kong. In 1966, at the age of 18, he left Hong Kong and came to Canada for his university education. He graduated from McGill University, Montreal, in 1969 with the Bachelor of Science (Honours Biological Sciences), and in 1973 with the Doctor of Medicine degree. After one year of internship at the Toronto General Hospital, he practised family medicine at the Community Health Centre in Regina, Saskatchewan during 1974-75. He then joined the University of Toronto’s Sioux Lookout Project in northwestern Ontario, a program of providing medical care to remote Aboriginal communities. For two years, he worked as a general practitioner in a small rural hospital and travelled to outlying communities by small airplane to hold clinics. It was there that he began his long-standing interest in community health, particularly cross-cultural health care in geographically remote and economically deprived communities. He realized he needed more formal training in public health and decided to obtain a Master of Science in Community Health from the University of Toronto.
In 1979, after completing his graduate studies, he went to Tanzania in East Africa as a volunteer with the Canadian University Service Overseas [CUSO]. There he was employed by the Ministry of Health in a training centre for "medical assistants", a cadre of front-line rural health workers who underwent an intensive 3-year course after secondary school in order to provide primary health care in the rural areas. His duties included both classroom and bedside teaching in clinical and community medicine, curriculum planning, and the design and supervision of projects in the villages.
After 2 years in Tanzania, Dr Young returned to Sioux Lookout, Ontario, where he was appointed Medical Director for the Sioux Lookout Zone, a part of the Indian health services network operated by the Department of National Health and Welfare of the Canadian government. The Sioux Lookout Zone provided both curative and preventive health services to a population of some 12,000 people living in 25 isolated communities, through a network of health centres, nursing stations and a general hospital.
In 1983 he joined the Department of Community Health Sciences in the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Manitoba as Assistant Professor. From 1988 to 1994 he was also Director of the Northern Health Research Unit. The Unit conducts community-based research, assists Aboriginal communities and organizations in health planning and program evaluation, and provides consultation to government agencies involved in northern and Aboriginal affairs.
He was promoted to Associate Professor in 1987 and full Professor in 1992. He was admitted a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada in 1984. During 1992/93, he was on leave at the Institute of Biological Anthropology, University of Oxford, during which time he prepared a Doctor of Philosophy dissertation, which was successfully defended in October 1994 and the degree granted in May 1995. In June 1998, he was appointed Head of the Department of Community Health Sciences, a post he held until Dec 2001. In January 2002 he began his new appointment as Professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences of the University of Toronto. In July 2004 he was appointed to the TransCanada Pipelines Chair in Aboriginal Health at the University of Toronto.
Dr Young's major research interest is in the area of northern and Aboriginal health, particularly in the epidemiology of chronic diseases such as diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. He has published over 90 articles in both the biomedical and social science literature and five books. He has been principal investigator of many research grants and contracts, totalling CDN$ 9 million since 1983. He was recipient of the National Health Research Scholar award for two 5-year terms and was recognized by the University of Manitoba for his research contributions by the Rh Award in 1988. Beginning in July 1998, he began a 5-year term as Senior Scientist of the Medical Research Council of Canada [renamed Senior Investigator of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research]. This was renewed for a second 5-year term in 2003.
Dr Young maintains his interests in international health and has served as a consultant for various international development agencies on assignment in the Philippines, India and Zimbabwe. He was World Health Organization Travelling Fellow in 1985 and visited Greenland and Alaska. He has also investigated Aboriginal health conditions in Arctic Russia and among Amazonian Indians in Brazil. In 1993 he was elected President of the International Union for Circumpolar Health. This is a federation of scientific organizations in Canada, USA, Scandinavia and Russia, devoted to improving the health of the populations in countries around the North Pole.
Conference Patron and Keynote Speaker
Dr Tom Calma
Dr Calma is an Aboriginal elder from the Kungarakan tribal group and a member of the Iwaidja tribal group whose traditional lands are south west of Darwin and on the Coburg Peninsula in the Northern Territory, respectively. He has been involved in Indigenous affairs at a local, community, state, national and international level and worked in the public sector for over 35 years and is currently on a number of boards and committees focussing on rural and remote Australia, health and education.
Dr Calma was appointed National Coordinator, Tackling Indigenous Smoking in March 2010 to lead the fight against tobacco use in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.
Dr Calma's most recent previous position was that of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner at the Australian Human Rights Commission from 2004 to 2010. He also served as Race Discrimination Commissioner from 2004 until 2009.
Through his 2005 Social Justice Report, Dr Calma called for the life expectancy gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people to be closed within a generation and laid the groundwork for the Close the Gap campaign. He chaired the Close the Gap Steering Committee for Indigenous Health Equality since its inception in March 2006 and is currently co-Chair of the steering committee. The Close the Gap campaign has effectively brought national attention to achieving health equality for Indigenous people by 2030.
Dr Calma has broad experience in public administration, particularly in Indigenous education and employment programs from both a national policy and program perspective.
He has served in roles within Australia relating to Indigenous and mainstream employment, community development and education, and as Senior Adviser to the Minister of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs. Internationally, Dr Calma worked as a senior Australian diplomat in India and Vietnam representing Australia's interests in education and training.
In 2007 Dr Calma was named by Bulletin Magazine as the Most Influential Indigenous Person in Australia and in 2008 he received an award from GQ Magazine after being named GQ Magazine's 2008 Man of Inspiration for his work in Indigenous Affairs.
In 2010, Dr Calma was awarded an honorary doctorate from Charles Darwin University in recognition of decades of public service, particularly in relation to his work in education, training and employment in Indigenous communities.
Dr Calma in 2010 was named by Australian Doctor Magazine as one of the 50 Most Influential People in medicine in Australia.
Prof Craig Anderson
Professor Craig Anderson is Director of the Neurological and Mental Health Division at The George Institute. He is also Professor of Stroke Medicine and Clinical Neurosciences in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Sydney and the Institute of Neurosciences of Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. Craig holds specialist qualifications in clinical neurology and geriatrics, and a PhD in medicine and epidemiology from The University of Western Australia.
Craig is a member of several specialist societies, is an Editor for the Cochrane Stroke Group, and a past President of the Stroke Society of Australasia. He has published widely on the clinical and epidemiological aspects of stroke, cardiovascular disease and aged care, and is on the Steering Committee for several large-scale epidemiological and clinical trial projects.
Prof Alex Brown
Alex Brown (BMed, MPH, FCSANZ, FRACP (hon.), PhD) is the Executive Director, BakerIDI Heart and Diabetes Institute Central Australia, based in Alice Springs. For the last 12 years Alex has been working in Aboriginal health from a public health perspective, specifically focused on policy development, communicable disease control, health service development and delivery, epidemiology and research. His research interests focus on cardiovascular disease disparity and its determinants, clinical and epidemiological cardiovascular research, chronic disease policy development, health services research, Indigenous male health, and unpacking the psychosocial determinants of Indigenous health.
Dr David Jansen
Dr David Jansen, Director, Mauri Ora Associates
MB.ChB, MRNZCGP, BHB, BA (Māori), Dip Tchg, GradCert Clin Tch
David is Ngāti Raukawa and was a resource teacher of Māori studies and language in the Hawkes Bay before he completed his medical training. He is also Chairman of Te Ataarangi Educational Trust and published a phrase book of Māori medical terms in February 2006 as a resource for the Māori health sector. David is a member of Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners and currently practices in Auckland. David has been teaching, lecturing, supervising and mentoring in the health sector for ten years. He brings an extensive knowledge of Māori language and culture in health contexts and a passion for improving Māori health. Mauri Ora Associates has worked with the Medical Council of New Zealand, RNZCGP, ACC and the wider NZ health sector on cultural competency training and resources.
Prof Garry Jennings
Post Nominals: AM, MB.BS, MD, FRCP, FRACP, FAHA, FCSANZ, MAICD
Garry Jennings is Director of Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute and Adjunct Professor of Medicine, Monash University. He is Past President of the Association of Australian Medical Research Institutes (AAMRI), and of the High Blood Pressure Research Council of Australia and Head, WHO Collaborating Centre for Research and Training in Cardiovascular Health.
A cardiologist, he was previously Director of Cardiology at The Alfred Hospital, Melbourne and Chair of the Division of Medicine and remains active in clinical cardiology at The Alfred.
In over 400 research publications he has reported discoveries on the mechanisms, prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease. He has published books on heart disease for the general public and is a regular media commentator on health and policy issues.
He is Chair of Nucleus Network, a subsidiary of Baker IDI and a member of the Boards of National Heart Foundation of Australia, Research Australia, Osprey Medical Inc (USA), and AAMRI, Trustee of the Asia Pacific Society of Hypertension and of the Foundation for High Blood Pressure Research and President of the 2012 International Society of Hypertension scientific meeting.
Dr Tania Riddell
Dr Tania Te Akau Riddell (Ng?ti Porou, Te Aitanga a Mahaki) is a public health specialist committed to the pursuit of improving cardiovascular health for Maori in Aotearoa, New Zealand. She works as a senior research fellow at the School of Population Health, Auckland. Her primary research involves a large prospective cohort study investigating the epidemiology of cardiovascular disease for Maori and non-Maori. Her other professional interests include primary care (having worked as a general practitioner for a number of years), the social and economic determinants of health, health policy and Maori rights.
Bridget Robson
Bridget Robson (Ngāti Raukawa) is director of Te Rōpū Rangahau Hauora a Eru Pōmare (the Eru Pōmare Māori Health Research Centre) at the University of Otago Wellington.
The Centre was established to undertake to develop health research by and for Māori, and to provide an environment where Māori can be trained in a variety of research techniques. Her research interests include the social and economic determinants of health, access to and quality of health care for Māori, and the societal determinants of disparity, including racism.
Bridget is currently leading the Unequal Treatment project on disparities in health care for heart disease, cervical cancer, and maternity care. She is a co-author of the Hauora: Māori Standards of Health series, and the Unequal Impact reports on cancer outcomes for Māori and non-Māori. She was involved in the development of the Health Equity Assessment Tool and Tackling Inequalities workshops for policymakers in the New Zealand health sector.
Prof Simon Stewart
PHD, FCSANZ, NFESC, FAHA
Group Leader, Population Studies and Profiling
Head, Preventative Health
Baker IDI Heart & Diabetes Institute
Prof. Simon Stewart is the Head of Preventative Health at the world-renowned Baker IDI Heart & Diabetes Institute in Melbourne, Australia (www.bakeridi.edu.au) and a National Health & Medical Research Council of Australia Senior Research Fellow. A past recipient of a prestigious National Heart Foundation of Australia Ralph Reader Fellowship (University of Glasgow, Scotland), his main focus of research has been developing community models of multidisciplinary care to optimize the prevention and management of chronic cardiac disease (e.g. chronic heart failure). Simon leads a range of large population-based research programs to monitor the evolving epidemic of cardiovascular disease in Australia and beyond (e.g. the Heart of Soweto Study in Africa). Simon is currently an Associate Editor of the International Journal of Cardiology and has published more then 200 research papers and books relating to the epidemiology and management of cardiac disease.
Traditional Healers
(L to R) Toby Ginger, Rupert Peter and Andy Tjilari
Andy, Toby and Rupert were born in the bush around 1940, in the far northwest corner of South Australia, near where the borders of South Australia, West Australia and the Northern Territory meet. They lived a traditional life with their families until the establishment of the first Mission in the area in Ernabella SA. Andy was one of the first children to attend Ernabella School.
Andy, Toby and Rupert began to learn the skills of the ngangkari (traditional healer) as young children in the bush. Their grandfathers gave them sacred tools and special powers, and trained them over many years. Andy, Toby and Rupert continue this tradition today with their own grandchildren.
Rupert, Andy, and more recently Toby, work for NPY Women's Council Ngangkari Project, funded by Country Health SA. NPYWC's region covers 350,000 square kilometres of the remote tri-State cross-border area of Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory. Anangu and Yarnangu (Aboriginal people) living on the Ngaanyatjarra, Pitjantjatjara and Yankunytjatjara lands share strong cultural and family affiliations. NPYWC began as an advocacy organisation but is now also a major provider of human services in the region.
Andy, Rupert and Toby provide ngangkari treatments to anangu (indigenous people) in remote communities in this region, as well as those in hospitals, jails, nursing homes and hostels in regional centres. Their work is highly valued and the service is in great demand. The ngangkari believe that better health outcomes for indigenous people can be achieved by ngangkari and western medicine working together and to this end they are committed to educating health workers about traditional healing practices. Andy, Toby and Rupert are accomplished public speakers who are authorised to speak publicly about traditional anangu culture and ngangkari practices. They have travelled across Australia and overseas addressing forums about the value of traditional healing and medicines, and also meet regularly with staff of Central Australian health services. They have received many accolades, the most recent being the Mark Sheldon Prize for 2009 awarded by the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatry (RANZCP), and the 2009 Dr Margaret Tobin Award for excellence in the provision of mental health services to those most in need.
In 2000 a group of over 50 ngangkari in Central Australia met and decided they would tell their stories as an attempt to educate non-indigenous health workers about the importance and value of ngangkari, with the aim of encouraging greater collaboration and understanding within the mainstream health system. NPY Women's Council has published a book of their stories called "Ngangkari Work Anangu Way" . A new edition of this book is planned for 2011.