Palmerston North GP David Hill and fellow Health Hub Project co-founders have begun creating a new medical centre, but say it will be less about medicine and more about the social determinants of health.
David Hill, Medical Director, Health Hub Project NZ says that:
"Doctors and other health professionals are good at helping people when they are sick and unwell. What we need to do is work out how people can become well, and stay well.
The health issues that affect low socioeconomic areas are the same as everywhere else in society – they include drug and alcohol addiction, obesity, high cardiovascular risk, diabetes, poor kidney health, heart disease and the list goes on, the difference is that low socioeconomic populations access to understanding how we might live differently, and access to resources to help people do so, are often limited or non-existent.
In Highbury, and throughout Palmerston, we are developing gateway health provider partnerships with community organisations, and in the first instance we are working in partnership with Te Aroha Noa Community Services.
The reason we do this is because they are the people that best know how to work with communities and families to support them to take charge of becoming healthy and well, and staying well"