The Muru Marri Indigenous Health Unit
Welcome
Welcome to the MURU MARRI INDIGENOUS HEALTH UNIT'S HOME PAGE. We hope that you find the information contained on this web site useful and interesting.
Mission Statement:
Guided by local and national community priorities, to contribute to the healing and positive health and well-being of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples through research, teaching, publication, representation on peak national bodies and public advocacy.
Vision Statement:
Muru Marri is an identifiable academic component of the School of Public Health and Community Medicine that is:
Responsible to the local Aboriginal communities in which it resides and all Indigenous communities in which it may work;
A culturally safe and inspiring place for people committed to, and working or training in, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health; and
Culturally and professionally supportive of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in their work as undergraduate or postgraduate students, teachers, researchers, and/or committee and community members.
The Muru Marri Indigenous Health Unit also assists and advises a special entry program into Medicine. This program is conducted by the Nura Gili and the Rural Clinical School and is designed to enable more Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to study Medicine. We currently have 15 students enrolled in medicine and 12 graduates.
In consultation with the community-controlled health sector, the unit aims to auspice research and expand the options for post-graduate training in Indigenous health.
For post-graduate students of medicine and the health sciences, Muru Marri Indigenous Health Unit delivers a 6UOC course PHCM9630 Indigenous Health in Australia.
Advocacy
The Muru Marri Indigenous Health Unit has also been a key player in the creation and maintainance of scholarships including the Shalom Gamarada Residential Scholarship program for Indigenous Medical students.
'We walk together as friends', the report of our work with Shalom College, can be found in ANTaR's Success Stories in Indigenous Health. The Shalom Gamarada program also featured in the CLOSETHEGAP DVD produced by Oxfam. This DVD was produced as part of the 2007 National Day of Action to CLOSETHEGAP in Indigenous life expectancy within a generation, and was screened at over 300 participating sites around Australia including UNSW.
Muru Marri Indigenous Health Unit also endorses the national campaign to CLOSETHEGAP. Find out more about CLOSETHEGAP ....
In 2007, MMIHU worked to raise awareness of the CLOSETHEGAP campaign with a broad range of on and off-campus activities, including a public forum on the National Day of Action to CLOSETHEGAP Day hosted by Prof Peter Smith, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine,
Speakers included Elizabeth Harris, Senior Lecturer & Director of the Centre for Health Equity Training Research & Evaluation (CHETRE) at UNSW’s School of Public Health and Community Medicine and Professor Ian Ring, Professorial Fellow at the University of Wollongong’s Centre for Health Service Development. The event was facilitated by Associate Professor Lisa Jackson Pulver, Director of UNSW’s Muru Marri Indigenous Health Unit.
View proceedings from UNSW's National Day of Action to CLOSETHEGAP here.
Muru Marri is also part of the steering committee for the Indigenous dental program, 'Filling the Gap', a program where volunteer dentists provide services to patients of Wuchopperen Health Service in Cairns, Far North Queensland. An evaluation of this project is currently underway. Find out more about how to get involved.
Breaking News
MMIHU Director Dr Lisa Jackson Pulver has recently been actively involved in the negotiations leading up to the landmark Motion offering an Apology to the Stolen Generations by the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on 13 February 2008. Research Assistant Sally Fitzpatrick also played a key role in organising events at the state and national level.
View UNSW Nura Gili staff and students talking about what the apology means to them here.
View excerpt from ABC Lateline featuring National Sorry Day Committee Co Chairs Helen Moran and Sally Fitzpatrick, where Helen and her family talk about the experience of being removed.
What has the Apology got to do with Indigenous health and wellbeing? See ABC Radio's News in Science here.