The health and wellbeing impacts of climate change are complex and far reaching requiring a
multi-sector approach to enhance community resilience. The Lord Mayors Charitable Foundation
(LMCF) (2019) acknowledges that increasing awareness and understanding of the health impacts
of climate change remains an area that requires significant effort from all levels of government,
health organisations and professional bodies, and the broader community. Victorian Primary Care
Partnerships (PCP) have existing established relationships with these cross sector organisations
and are well placed to lead action, however, in the past PCPs have faced challenges with capacity
and capability with only a small minority having a focus on climate change. Southern Grampians
Glenelg PCP (SGGPCP) has been leading this work since 2008 and through the LMCF funded Primary Care Partnerships for Community Resilience (PCP4CR) worked with SGGPCP locally and two other PCPs to highlight the value of the role of Victorian PCPs. Capitalising on their connections with diverse stakeholders and implementing an innovative participatory approach (Group Model Building), enabled the PCPs to understand the complexity in their local context and identify actions to respond.
Primary Care Partnerships for Community Resilience final report: Primary Care Partnerships for Community Resilience
Southern Grampians Glenelg Primary Care Partnership Trial
In May 2019 an enthusiastic group of SGGPCP Partners and Stakeholders came together to share their diverse knowledge and experience in a workshop to understand the impacts of climate change on the health and wellbeing of our community. Using Group Model Building (techniques introduced to SGGPCP by the Global Obesity Centre at Deakin University (GLOBE), the group created a map that represented the connections between the factors they identified resulting from climate change that impact health and wellbeing. To view an overview of the trial workshops:
Enliven
In October 2019 an enthusiastic group of enliven Partners and Stakeholders came together in the outer eastern suburbs of Melbourne to share their diverse knowledge and experience in a workshop to understand the enablers and barriers that affect them meeting their diverse communities’ cultural and communication needs when addressing the impacts of climate change. Using Group Model Building the group created a map that represented the connections between the factors they identified.
Central Victorian PCP
Fifteen representatives from eleven diverse organisations attended two workshops facilitated by SGGPCP in February and March 2020. These workshops were delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic, however significant readiness conversations took place with the invited stakeholders and others (who identify as working to address the impacts of climate change and or in the field of health and wellbeing) to scope what was already happening in the Mount Alexander Shire regarding addressing the impacts of climate change on the health and wellbeing of people in a vulnerable state. This resulted in a map of the current work being undertaken within the shire and was a significant asset to not only establish current work but also to align conversations and establish need. The final systems map developed by the CVPCP group through the GMB workshops focussed on four themes; Policy; Equity, Access and Inclusion; Connection; Knowledge and Action.
CVPCP workshop summary: CVPCP final report