Indigenous health

• Resources
• Research strategies
• Writing and citing

Resources for indigenous health

• Definitions, facts, figures and overviews
• Books and more
• Subject readings
• Journal articles
• Internet sites

• Evidence-based Health Practice
• Nursing
• Public health
• Governments and organisations
• Statistics for health and behavioural sciences

Indigenous health definitions, facts, figures and overviews

• Dictionaries help you to define your keywords
• Encyclopedias help you to get an overview of your topic and provide more information than a dictionary
• Handbooks and manuals provide figures and facts

Online dictionaries, encyclopedias and handbooks

Print dictionaries and encyclopedias

To find additional reference items

1. Search the Library Catalogue
2. Select advanced keyword search
3. Combine a broad keyword AND the word dictionar**
   
   medicine AND dictionar**
   medicine AND encyclop**
   aborigines and encyclop**
   
   
4. To retrieve variations of your keyword use the truncation symbol **
   
   e.g. medicin** will retrieve medicine, medicines, medicinal (use faculty specific example)

Need help? Ask a question.

top of page

Indigenous health books and more

Search the Library Catalogue to find books, videos, CDs

If you know the exact title

1. Select title search
2. Type in the exact title
3. Check the location, call number and status boxes to find the item in the Library collection

If you don't have an exact title OR only have a topic area

1. Select advanced keyword search
2. Type in keywords from your topic
3. Combine your keywords with AND to find catalogue records that contain all of your keywords
   
   e.g. aborigines AND health
   
   
4. To retrieve variations of your keyword use the truncation symbol **
   
   e.g. medicin** will retrieve medicine, medicines, medicinal [give faculty-specific example]

Catalogue search tips:

• Too many hits? Add another keyword e.g. drug design AND medicinal AND chemistry [give faculty-specific example]
  OR
  Use the limit functions in advanced keyword search e.g. limit by publication date, format, location
• Found a useful title? Click on the subject headings to find similar material
• Studying at a different UOW campus? Use an advanced keyword search and limit by location

Need help? Ask a question.

top of page

Indigenous health journal articles

Search a database to find journal articles, book chapters, conference papers and research reports

Try these first

Complete list of Health and Behavioural Sciences databases

Found a useful reference?

Some databases do not provide the fulltext of the article. To locate these articles, you will need to search the catalogue to determine if the Library holds the journal title(s) either in print or electronically on another database.

Database search tips:

• Break your topic into keywords and/or phrases. The search strategy worksheet will help you
• Consider alternative keywords or spelling variations
• To narrow your search combine your keywords with AND to find records that contain all your keywords
  
  e.g. isotopes AND uranium
  
  
• To broaden your search combine your keywords with OR to find records that contain either of your keywords
  
  e.g. uranium OR plutonium
  
  
• Use truncation to retrieve variations of your keyword.
  
  e.g. atom* retrieves atom, atoms, atomic. [use faculty specific example]
  
  
• Found a useful reference? Use the subject headings to find similar material
• Use library database tips or the database help screens for tips on how to search

More information: Finding Journal Articles Tutorial

Need help? Ask a question.

top of page

Indigenous Health Internet sites

It is important to critically evaluate all information found on the Web.

Try the following sites as a starting point.

• General
• Reports
• Human rights, reconciliation & law
• Government and International agencies
• Research
• Australian Studies
  
  
• Search engines
• Directories
• UOW sites

General

• Office for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health (OATSIH), within Department of Health & Ageing
• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Workforce, within OATSIH
• Northern Territory Government Department of Health and Community Services
• Congress of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Nurses (CATSIN)
• Australian Institute of Health and Welfare
• Menzies School of Health Research (MSHR), Royal Darwin Hospital. MSHR is the only Australian health and medical research institute with a primary focus on the health of Indigenous communities and people living in tropical and remote areas.

Reports

Print and further electronic reports can be located via the library catalogue using the relevant keywords.

• Health is life: Report on the inquiry into indigenous health (June 2000)
• Royal Commission on Aboriginal deaths in custody
• South East Arnhem Land Collaborative Research Project working paper series

Human rights, reconciliation & law

• Human Rights & Equal Opportunities Commission (HREOC), Australia
• Reconciliation Australia
  Provides a historical overview of the history of reconciliation in Australia
• Council for Aboriginal Reconciliation Archive
• National Native Tribunal
• Aboriginal Law
  links from the National Library of Australia
• Indigenous law resources

Government and international agencies

• Indigenous affairs
  Indigenous affairs at government and international level
• Indigenous affairs resources
  Contains government information resources, directories, statistics, issues. (Parliamentary Library)

Research

• Guidelines for Ethical Research in Indigenous Studies (AIATSIS)

Australian Studies

• Australian Indigenous HealthInfoNet
  Aims to contribute to improving the health of Australia's Indigenous people by making relevant, high quality knowledge and information easily accessible
• Australian Institute of Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Studies
  Promoting knowledge and understanding of Australian Indigenous cultures, past and present

Search engines

Search engines create databases using computer programs called 'spiders', 'robots' or 'crawlers' that trawl the web and other Internet sites and return results to the database.

Try these first:

• HealthInsite (Australian)
  Aims to improve the health of Australians by providing easy access to quality information about human health.
• Google Scholar
• Other search engines and directories

Directories

Directories organise Internet resources by subject. The information provided in directories is created, arranged and maintained by people rather than machines.

• HealthInsite (Australian)
  Aims to improve the health of Australians by providing easy access to quality information about human health. An Australian Government initiative.
• Healthfinder
  US Department of Health and Human Services consumer information web site
• World Wide Web Virtual Library - Indigenous studies

UOW sites

• Aboriginal studies (library site)
• Woolyungah Indigenous Centre
• School of Nursing, Midwifery & Indigenous Health

top of page

Last reviewed: 19 September, 2007