Despite the proven role of sleep in physical health and social-emotional wellbeing improvements, there is a lack of attention to sleep health, particularly education and health service availability in Indigenous communities.
The presentation will cover the causes and effects of poor sleep in Indigenous populations and explore the implications of the study’s findings. It will set out how researchers, clinicians, health workers, and educators can access information and resources to diagnose and manage sleep issues, and develop ideas for future research to promote sleep health in Indigenous communities.
Speakers:
Professor Sarah Blunden is Head of Paediatric Sleep Research at Central Queensland University and is a practicing clinical psychologist specialising in the treatment of sleep and related problems. She is the Founder/Director of Sensible Sleep, the elected paediatric representative of the Australasian Sleep Association (ASA) Education committee and co-chairs the Indigenous Sleep Working Party of the ASA.
Dr Fatima Yaqoot is an Epidemiologist and Sleep Scientist, currently working as a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Social Science Research (UQ). Her research aims to promote sleep health in First Nations communities through coordinated multidisciplinary research, improved community awareness, local capacity building and place-based service delivery models. Fatima leads the “Let’s Yarn About Sleep” program and is a member of the Indigenous Sleep Working Party of the Australasian Sleep Association (ASA).
This webinar will be chaired by Stephanie Yiallourou. Dr Yiallourou is a public health researcher with a strong focus on sleep health in socially disadvantaged populations. She has successfully established as CI (including NHMRC and MRFF projects) a number of sleep related projects including large-scale public health projects in Indigenous populations. As part of the BIRCH study, she led community screening for sleep problems in over 200 Indigenous Australians in North Queensland and Central Australia. Also, as part of the MODERN trial, she led sleep assessment in 275 residents in regional communities. She served as Co-Chair of the ASA Indigenous Sleep Working Party from 2018-2021, and as a co-author on the international report outlining sleep health in Indigenous Australians she is emerging as a leader in the sleep field.
What are the 2-3 key points that the audience will take away after attending this webinar?
- Similar to other areas of Health, sleep health is poorer in Indigenous Australians compared to their non-Indigenous peers
- Culturally appropriate sleep health diagnostic tools and services limit our capacity to improve this especially in rural and regional Australia
- Continuing investigation with and for Indigenous Australians can help us understand how to improve sleep and overall health in these populations.
Who would benefit from attending this webinar?
Sleep researchers, clinicians, public health and public policy experts, trainees and anyone interested in promoting sleep health in Indigenous communities and putting research into practice.
This webinar is free for ASA members and open to non-members for a registration fee of $45. To register you will need to log in with your member details, or create an account on this website if you're not a member.
The webinar will be recorded and made available online afterwards - free to ASA members and for a small fee to others. By registering to attend, you are giving your permission to be recorded.
Please note:
- You will need to finalise your registration through the shopping cart, even if you are registering for free
- Registrations closes three hours before (2:00pm AEDT) the webinar starts and you will not be able to register after that
- We will email you the webinar access details in the lead up to the webinar and again on the day of the webinar
Enquiries about this webinar should be directed to Asha Mohabir.
Date: Wednesday, 2 March 2022
Time: 5:00pm - NSW, VIC, ACT and TAS
4:30pm - SA
4:00pm - QLD
3:30pm - NT
2:00pm - WA
7:00pm - NZ