BUSHkids is a non-profit, non-government community organisation that offers a diverse range of free allied health services to children and their families living in rural Queensland. In 2011 BUSHkids celebrated its 75th year of operation. While the process of service delivery has evolved over time, the key to the organisation’s work still lies in providing equitable health services access for children and families across rural Queensland. BUSHkids aims to enhance the health and wellbeing of children and families by providing holistic, evidence-based, family-centred interventions with a key focus on prevention and early intervention.
There are six BUSHkids centres operating across Queensland located in Dalby, Warwick, Emerald, Bundaberg and Mt Isa, with a Family Health Support Worker based in Inglewood. Each centre has a multi-disciplinary team comprised of a psychologist, speech pathologist, occupational therapist and family health support worker. The primary focus of BUSHkids work includes: early intervention and prevention programs; multi-disciplinary assessment and intervention programs for children presenting with complex needs; social, emotional and behavioural programs; and community education, advocacy and health promotion programs.
BUSHkids centres provide a range of assessment and short-term therapy (group and individual) services for children, support and education for parents and others in the community, and consultancy and advice services. Services are delivered in the centres, out in the community (for example, in kindergartens, schools, community centres) and through outreach into rural towns.
The psychologist’s work
The focus of the psychologist’s work at the Dalby centre is on emotional, social, behavioural and academic difficulties in children aged 0 to 10 and their families. Common presenting concerns include anxiety, school refusal, learning and academic progress concerns, anger and aggression, social skills, difficult behaviours (tantrums, oppositional or destructive behaviours), low mood and self-esteem, and coping with family/life changes.
A crucial aspect of the work is helping parents and children to understand the nature of the difficulties, identifying what may be contributing to them and identifying the strengths and protective factors in place for that child. While some children are referred to the BUSHkids service with pre-existing developmental disabilities or behavioural disorders, the psychologist also plays a role in conducting assessments to help families obtain a diagnosis from specialists and enable them to access necessary funding and supports. As children’s difficulties are often complex in nature, working collaboratively within the multidisciplinary team to better understand a child is also a crucial part of the role. Having access to other allied health professionals enables a comprehensive picture of a child to be gained and allows parents to establish some clear and realistic goals for intervention and engagement with the BUSHkids service.
Children and parents accessing psychology support through BUSHkids are offered short-term evidence-based interventions. While some of the intervention work may be done just with the children on developing their social and emotional coping skills, there is a significant emphasis on parent involvement in intervention. By providing education and support for the parents around their child’s difficulties, parents understand the important role they play in their child’s development and take charge in making positive changes to their attitudes and behaviours which translates to better outcomes for the children.
More recently a focus of the role has been building awareness and education in the community about the importance of early intervention for social, emotional, behavioural and developmental issues. The central goal for this process is to educate key players such as parents, health and educational professionals, on intervening early to assist with future outcomes and empowering them to take positive action.
| In this role I have developed a real passion for working as a psychologist with children and families. While working in this field does present a range of professional and personal challenges, seeing the positive impact our service has on many children and families in the community drives me to continue. Working for an NGO has allowed me to use my skills to help people from all backgrounds who may otherwise be unable to access services. Being able to do this sort of work in providing equitable services to some of the most vulnerable people in the community gives me great sense of pride and fulfilment. |