Prevention programs are urgently required to help prevent dementia in older Aboriginal populations. Given the links between cardiovascular risk factors and vascular dementia, The Kaat Koort study is testing how brain (‘Kaat’ in Noongar language) health can be improved by improving heart (Koort) health. This five-year NHRMC-funded study is being led by an expert team of national and international researchers, led foremost by Professor Sandra Eades (Noongar) from the University of Melbourne, with collaborators from Australian National University and the University of New South Wales and in partnership with the Derbarl Yerrigan Health Service and the South West Aboriginal Medical Service in south-west Western Australia. The study will be conducted in two phases. The study is conducted in two phases. Phase 1 involved consultations with the health service partners and the community to ensure the program for Phase 2 is acceptable to the community. Phase 1 is now complete. In Phase 2, we will undertake a randomised-controlled trial to test the effectiveness of the Aboriginal-health worker led program composed targeting diet, exercise, mental health, smoking cessation and disease management on reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease and cognitive decline. Phase 2 is underway and expected to finish collection activities in July 2024.
Perspectives, understandings of dementia and lived experiences from Australian Aboriginal people in Western Australia
Type
Dataset
Publication date
Rights notice
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution- Non Commercial- No Derivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.© 2022 The Authors. Australasian Journal on Ageing published by John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd on behalf of AJA Inc’