The Victorian Agency for Health Information (VAHI) has stepped up its working to improve the healthcare experience of people from culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) by increasing their representation in the data it collects.
Chief Executive of VAHI, Lance Emerson said CALD communities had been historically under-represented in the Agency’s Victorian Healthcare Experience Survey (VHES), which collects and analyses the experience of recent users of the State’s public health system.
Dr Emerson said the VHES program included 19 surveys targeting different types of health treatments and services.
“Victoria is one of the most culturally diverse States in Australia, with almost half the population either born overseas or having a parent born overseas,” Dr Emerson said.
“Historically, people from CALD backgrounds have participated less in the VHES, limiting understanding about their experiences of care compared to non-CALD people,” he said.
“This makes it difficult for health services to identify areas of health care improvement and implement actions that will improve health care experiences for people from CALD backgrounds.”
Dr Emerson said that improving the representation of diverse audiences in the VHES program was critical to ensuring all Victorians received the best possible healthcare, regardless of who they were or where they lived.
He said VAHI had engaged the Social Research Centre to work with people from diverse backgrounds to identify the barriers they face in completing surveys about their experiences, and to develop actions to help increase participation.
“The project has been boosted by the support of the Patient Reported Measures Research Collaborative, a South Australian based professional network of people with expertise in Patient Reported Measures (PRMs) research,” the VAHI Chief Executive said.
“This collaboration will help further inform understanding of the key barriers to participation and actions to overcome these barriers,” Dr Emerson said.
