It's a health push directed squarely at Filipino-Australians. Sydney resident Della Maneze was a practicing medical doctor in the Philippines before she moved to Australia. Today she is working for the health service as he multicultural health promotion officer, which is medicine in a wider community setting.
Maneze is now enrolled in a PhD program with the University of Technology, Sydney and her research is aptly on Filipino health.
"Immigrants from the Philippines are one of the top five populations groups in Australia. Despite that, very little research has been done on their health," she said.
But the community is growing and have shown increasing incidence of chronic diseases, such as diabetes and heart disease. "It would be very helpful if health research can explore the factors influencing the incidence of these chronic diseases and thus enable the [government] services to plan better health promotion strategies."
The study has been approved by the university human research ethics committee and Maneze hopes to get at least 5,000 respondents by March 2012. The questionnaire is completely anonymous and takes around 12 minutes or less to complete. Participants have to be 18 and over, of Filipino heritage (one or both parents Filipino) and living in Australia. Here is the link to the survey or click here.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Acculturation_and_health_seeking_behaviour_among_Filipino_Australians_ATLAS_study_Della_ManezeMD
Participants can also respond via the study's Facebook page below.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/KTBWNXP
The Australian Filipina Magazine is a proud supporter of this study and invites all our readers to participate. We also encourage you to share this article or survey link with your family and friends.