Bridging the Heart Gap: Building partnerships to improve paediatric cardiac surgery care equity

Queensland and Western Australian children with cardiac conditions must travel to Brisbane or Perth for their critical, time-dependent surgery. First Nations children are over-represented in this population, primarily due to congenital heart disease and rheumatic heart disease. For First Nations children and families based in rural and regional Queensland and Western Australia, this travel can be distressing, disconnecting, and disorientating. This has resulted in poor long-term outcomes, including delayed procedures and reduced long-term survival.

Our vision is to provide timely, equitable access to the best care for First Nations children, families and communities undergoing cardiac surgery.

In this consumer-and clinician-led research project we will do this by:

Aim 1. Developing a partnership model of care that facilitates culturally appropriate care that can be personalised to the individual child, family, community, and health service needs.

Aim 2. Implementing this partnership model of care across Queensland and Western Australia.

Aim 3. Evaluating the partnership model of care effectiveness.

The project is underpinned by long-term partnerships between First Nations communities and health services across Queensland and Western Australia, including successful co-design and implementation of a pilot program. Together, our transdisciplinary team of clinicians, Indigenous and academic partners have the capacity and influence to design and implement a model of care that is scalable to the wider Australian health system supporting First Nations children needing time-critical cardiac procedures, as well as others in regional and remote settings.