Commonalities and challenges: A review of Australian state and territory maternity and child health policies

Abstract

Nurses and midwives play a key role in providing universal maternal, child and family health services in Australia. However, the Australian federation of states and territories has resulted in policy frameworks that differ across jurisdictions and services that are fragmented across disciplines and sectors. This paper reports the findings of a study that reviewed and synthesised current Australian service policy or frameworks for maternity and child health services in order to identify the degree of commonality across jurisdictions and the compatibility with international research on child development. Key maternity and child health service policy documents in each jurisdiction were sourced. The findings indicate that current policies were in line with international research and policy directions, emphasising prevention and early intervention, continuity of care, collaboration and integrated services. The congruence of policies suggests the time is right to consider the introduction of a national approach to universal maternal, child health services.

Why health visiting? Examining the potential public health benefits from health visiting practice within a universal service: A narrative review of the literature

“…A universal child and family health nursing service is provided free of charge to all children from birth to five and their families across Australia, although coverage varies in the different states and territories (Schmied et al 2011). Likewise, public health early child A c c e p t e d M a n u s c r i p 10 collaboratively to develop local services and ensure families know about them (Department of Health, 2010.…”

Supporting Maternal Transition: Continuity, Coaching, and Control

“…contexts (Schmied et al, 2011;Schmied et al, 2010). There are numerous programs and services that are designed to support families.…”

Family Health Medical Practices and Nursing Care: a Bibliometric Approach

“…The second article [34] that presents a citation relationship was published in 2010 and is cited by a study in 2011 [37], here it is interesting to note that a self-citation occurs. Thus, this author presents two articles among the most cited by the 594 articles that were part of this study, indicating a productive and highly referenced author.…”

“…In 2011, the author autocitizes in a paper that discusses the context of public policies available in Australia for the health care of pregnant women and children [37]. In the other articles of the Local Citation Score, they do not present a citation relation [26,38,39,40,41,42].…”