Two Masters of Social Work students from The University of Western Australia have won hearts and reconnected with their own cultural identities as part of a unique collaboration designed to protect older members of Perth's Chinese community from falls.
Yuening (Ning) Zhou and Shijie Zhang spent five weeks with Chinese elders at the Chung Wah Community Care centre in Willetton this year as part of their placement with UWA's WA Centre for Health and Ageing (WACHA).
Professor Anne-Marie Hill and research fellow Dr Cheng Yen Loo had invited the students to work with WACHA on a project which aims to deliver falls prevention education to culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities.
The Safe Recovery Program, which shares simple steps on how to avoid falls during hospital admissions, was initially developed for English-speaking patients but is now being adapted into different languages, including Chinese, to expand its reach.
"There were more than 43,000 WA hospital emergency department attendances for falls in 2023 alone, with falls now costing the WA economy more than half a billion dollars yearly," Professor Hill said.
While falls prevention education does exist for older people, Dr Loo's work has identified that more vulnerable groups – such as those from CALD backgrounds – often need more culturally appropriate resources.
"Older people from these backgrounds often end up having to rely on cultural brokers – people like their adult children or translators who may not understand the cultural nuances," Dr Loo said.
"That can inform their willingness to engage and accept information.
"Providing health information in their own language gives them a sense of agency and ensures they're directly informed and involved in the conversation around their own safety and wellbeing."
Having previously decided they'd like to support Masters of Social Work students with placements, WACHA brought Ning and Shijie – who both speak Mandarin – on board to help share the adapted resources with the local Chinese community.
After a couple of weeks getting to know the Chinese elders who attend the Chung Wah community centre, Ning and Shijie gave a presentation on falls prevention and ran a Q&A session – all in Mandarin.
Both were struck by how warmly the participants responded to information delivered by people they could relate to culturally – with some coming to view the students as akin to their own grandchildren.
"I could see they could definitely feel I really care about them, because we are from the same cultural background and we can share a lot of stories," Shijie said.
"They don't think this is wasting their time – they just want to make a friend with me."
Image: Social work student Shijie Zhang with Aunty Yang.
The students later conducted research interviews with the Chinese elders to explore their experiences accessing health information in Australia while speaking little to no English.
None had previously received any falls-related education, highlighting the urgency of delivering health education programs specifically tailored for CALD communities.
"Many older Chinese people who migrate to Australia cannot speak English or aren't that fluent, so especially in hospital settings it's harder for them to communicate with medical staff," Ning said.
"A lot of them feel alienated and isolated in a country they're not that familiar with and even with their own grandchildren there can be a cultural divide – sometimes they don't speak the same language because their grandchildren may not be willing to learn Mandarin, Cantonese or dialects.
"One of the grandmas even cried while talking to me about this. It made me realise how important it is for us to have a culturally responsive workforce in Australia so we can make our programs and hospitals more accessible and welcoming to all communities who live here."
The experience reminded both students of the value of their own backgrounds.
"It was only after this placement that I realised how important my cultural identity is to me as a social worker," Ning said.
"Just being able to speak the language and having those shared experiences and shared cultural backgrounds is so valuable when you're engaging with vulnerable people from CALD communities – I can definitely see myself working in this field in the future."
Shijie said the experience had underscored the link between research and high-quality social work.
"All the good quality of services from social work is from research," he said.
"Research involves a lot of data collection and analysis, and from that data we can provide good advice to improve social work services."
The Safe Recovery resources have so far been translated into Chinese, Vietnamese and Arabic, with plans to expand to other cultural groups including Greek and Italian communities.
Dr Loo said the collaboration between WACHA and the Social Work students had been mutually beneficial, adding to the falls prevention project while allowing WACHA to mentor the students and help them develop soft skills that would benefit them in the future.
"It's been really beneficial for both sides in terms of delivering health promotion to the community, but also giving back to social work students by helping them get ready for the workforce," Dr Loo said.
