‘Ask someone, what is their Dreaming?’: Exploring occupational performance coaching with service providers supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families

Introduction

Culturally responsive health services have been highlighted as a national priority in Australia. Yet, Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander families still experience notable challenges accessing and engaging in culturally responsive health and community services across states and territories in Australia.

Methods

Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander health service providers partnered with researchers to consider the alignment of occupational performance coaching (OPC) with current practice and its potential applicability when working with Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander families. Yarning Circle methodologies were adopted to support data collection, with main themes analysed using a blend of evidence-based approaches from Indigenous and Western cultures, including Thought Ritual and reflexive thematic analysis.

Consumer and Community Involvement

Description and depiction of themes were co-developed by members of the research team, including researchers and service providers from Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander and white cultural backgrounds from Australia and New Zealand.

Findings

Four key themes emerged from the Yarning Circles and were described and depicted iteratively until agreement was reached. The themes, which intersect around concepts of Dreaming, relationship-building, system disruption, and moving forward, describe how Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander health service providers consider their ways of working in response to prompts around the three domains of OPC. The imagery of a river depicts the links between, and flow of, themes that emerged from the data, with synergy with OPC domains described.

Conclusion

OPC holds promise as an approach for family support, from the perspective of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander health service providers. Further work is needed to explore its feasibility and applicability from multiple perspectives, including family and community members across all regions of Australia.