Community-led, culturally sensitive information increases awareness and helps more women tested — and that’s where our Enliven service came in.
As experts in multicultural community engagement, Enliven supported the national Own It campaign to create culturally appropriate resources and hold workshops to reduce barriers to cervical screening.
Codesign and collaboration is key
The first step was to ask communities what mattered to them.
We recruited and trained Community Health Champions, active community members with cultural knowledge and experience who could engage with their communities in-language in a relevant way.
After completing training from Cancer Council Victoria, Community Health Champions shared information about cervical screening at workshops.
Rebecca Abernethy, Coordinator Multicultural Community Engagement at Enliven, said the workshops gave women the chance to talk about their concerns, experiences and beliefs around cervical screening.
Speaking directly with women taught us a lot. We realised that options for testing, including self-screening, weren’t commonly understood. There was also a lot of misinformation and stigma, some women were unclear about who should get tested.
— Rebecca
The right information can save lives
Results from the workshops showed that the approach worked: 70% of participants said they would get tested, up from 47% before the sessions.
Rebecca said culturally appropriate information gave women choice and options about their health.
Having cervical screening information in different languages empowers people to take control of their screening choices, addressing eligibility confusion and tackling some significant personal screening barriers.
— Rebecca
Enliven's cervical screening information card in Chinese
Thanks to our partners
Thanks to Australian Multicultural Health Collaborative for funding this project, our partners at the Cancer Council Victoria and Monash Health’s South East Public Health, and especially to our Community Health Champions.
Order the resources
Would cervical screening information be helpful to you, or a group you work with?
Contact Enliven via Rebecca.Abernethy@each.com.au, or call 0413 303 076 to order our free resources in English, Arabic, Hindi, Mandarin, and Punjabi.
