Our Vision is to improve the health and wellbeing of women in the Southern Metropolitan Region within a Social Model of Health and within a feminist framework.

Our Overall Health Promotion Goal is a planned, integrated and holistic approach to best practice in Women’s Health Service Delivery for women, particularly marginalised women.
   

Our current Health Promotion Priority Areas are:

  • Mental Health and Social Connectedness
    Goal:
    A planned and integrated whole-of-organisation approach to improve best practice in women’s health service delivery.
    Objective:
    To improve the mental health and social connectedness of women in the Southern Metropolitan area.
  • Preventing Violence against Women
    Goal
    A planned and integrated whole-of-organisation approach to improve best practice in women’s health service delivery.
    Objective:
    To prevent violence against women by capacity building, advocacy and empowerment of women through information dissemination.
  • Sexual and Reproductive Health
    Goal:
    A planned and integrated whole-of-organisation approach to improve best practice in women’s health service delivery.
    Objective:
    To prevent violence against women by capacity building, advocacy and empowerment of women through information dissemination.
Self-help/ Support Groups

Self-Help Groups supports and encourages women affected by common issues and similar backgrounds......

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Outreach to Workplaces

Early in 2008 WHISE commenced a pilot Outreach Health Information in the Workplace Program,……

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Mental Health Promotion

Act - Walk, swim, read, do a crossword puzzle
Belong - Join a group, chat to a neighbour
Commit - Take a challenge, get involved, volunteer

[www.actbelongcommit.org.au]
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
   

In addressing these priorities, WHISE will use demographic and health-related data to identify need within its catchment area. This data will be obtained from a range of sources – Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) census data, local government data, Primary Care Partnership (PCP) data, Department of Human Services (DHS) data, and information contained in recent service reports and strategic plans of our service colleagues, in addition to our own client data.

WHISE will work in collaboration with other service providers in the Southern Metropolitan Region, and will be involved in the Primary Care Partnerships of the region - Kingston/ Bayside PCP, Inner South East Partnership in Community & Health (ISEPICH), South Eastern Partnerships (HCP), and  Frankston/ Mornington Peninsula PCP.

Health Promotion Delivery Rationale

We are a service with limited resources, covering an extensive geographic region, with ten local government areas, four Primary Care Partnerships, and immense social, cultural and economic differences across the region.

Our model of Health Promotion therefore seeks to identify the areas of considerable need, and to focus on those areas for a period of time.

We attend PCP meetings and other network meetings where these are specifically related to our annual objectives, and maintain a watching brief at other times, so as to achieve the maximum impact with our input.

The Strategic Planning process of 2006 identified a number of marginalised groups which are not currently being addressed equally within the current health service frameworks. These include:

  • Culturally and linguistically diverse women
  • Women with Disabilities
  • Indigenous Women
  • Young (15-25) and Older women (50+)
  • Lesbian and same-sex attracted women

WHISE will address issues that impact on these groups of marginalised women.

> World Health Organisation (WHO) definition of Health