Our team was proud to support and attend the Flowing Strong: Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Hypertension Summit held at UniSA on Kaurna Country (Adelaide) last Thursday 4 December where the focus was on taking the first steps toward a culturally determined hypertension action plan supporting the cultural application of the National Hypertension Taskforce’s roadmap.

Facilitated and led by Andrew Goodman who is part of the National Hypertension Taskforce and Alicia Veasey, Co-Founder and Managing Director of Gullidala, the summit brought together Indigenous representatives from across the country, Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations, Indigenous health workers, Primary Health Networks, and also those with lived experience to explore practical, evidence-based approaches to prevent, detect and effectively treat hypertension in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.

Key presentations from Andrew Goodman (CSIRO), Niamh Chapman (Sydney University),Rob Tassie (ACvA) and Alicia Veasey (Gullidala) set the scene for conversations about why this work matters and how we can drive change together. Guided breakout sessions on prevention, detection and treatment followed, highlighting the work that is already happening on the ground and the importance of working alongside community to drive improvements that matter.

We’re grateful to Alicia Veasey, from Gullidala for facilitating the day, to the speakers for thoughtful presentations and to all participants for generously sharing their insights and experiences. Closing reflections from Alicia Veasey and Andrew Goodman reinforced the importance of co-design and working with the community and health workers to drive improvements that matter.

The summit was part of Dr Goodman’s project Preventing, detecting and effectively treating hypertension in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples which received funding through the ACvA Clinical Themes Seed Funding Opportunity earlier this year.

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