From Vision Australia. This is talking vision. And now here's your host, Sam Collins.
Hello everyone. It's great to be here with you. And for the next half hour we talk matters of blindness and low vision.
Things like orientation around a room or a clinic room or a busy ward is intimidating for everybody. And then if there are additional supports that somebody might require, or that experience might be pretty stressful. So the DLO can help in those kinds of situations. So we would work directly with the individual and talking to them about what they might need, what kind of orientation they might need
around the environment they're in. And we would also communicate with us with the staff members around that person.
Welcome to the program. We've got a couple of exciting interviews for you this week featuring Christine and Jill from the Disability Liaison Officer Program, a program through the Victorian Government to enable people with disability to access the health care that they require. Now that interviews coming up very shortly. So make sure to stick around to hear more from Christine and Jill. Then after you hear from them, we've
got Jordan Ashby from the Telling Program. He's here to tell us all about the January Tell a link special interest program, in particular, three webinars with prominent figures from the blind and low vision community achieving really cool things. And then to wrap up, Frances Kalen joins us with a way to recommend it, and we finish with some news and information. I hope you'll enjoy this week's episode
of Talking Vision. For people who are blind or have low vision, or for people with disability more generally, they may have experienced issues in the past with accessing the health care they require and face a series of concerns or frustrations when trying to receive health care that is accessible and meets their needs. That's where our next two
guests come in. Their names are Kristen and Jillian, and they are both disability liaison officers working together with the Victorian Department of Health to overcome these barriers in the health care sector. And they join me now to talk all about it. Joe, Kristen, thanks so much for being with us today.
Thank you. Thanks so much.
Kristen will come to you. Firstly, tell us a bit about the Disability Liaison Officer program.
Sure. So the Disability Liaison Officer program or the DLO program, um, commenced in 2020. And this year, um, the Victorian state budget has committed a further funding to continue the program for at least another three years. So we have Delos, um, a based in health services across both metropolitan and regional Victoria. And we work to provide direct and indirect support to people with disability so they can access the health care that they need.
And, um, Kristen, could you tell our listeners a bit about what a disability liaison officer does?
Yeah, sure. So the disability liaison officers, um, work here in the hospital to support people with disability to get access to the right healthcare at the right time in a way that suits them. So very patient centered. We do a lot of things, um, different things. And this will largely be dependent on what the person identifies as they might need. Um, so some examples, uh, like advocating for longer appointment times or, um, noting down patient preferences
and how they can receive their health care. Um, and including things like communication preferences and that can support staff to know how best to communicate with the patient and with the healthcare staff, in addition to working one on one with people, the dialogue is also champion and support
delivery of service improvement activities. Um and dealers um have the skills to lay out or carry out strategic activity where the objective of that activity is to support equitable and optimal access to healthcare so we can do things in the space of influence or advocate advocate for systemic change, support the delivery of disability action plans within health services.
Provide some broader staff education to build disability confident workforce, and partnering with other health services in the department to deliver on some of the um service improvement activities in inclusive Victoria, the State disability Action Plan.
And Jill, did you have anything to add there?
I'm going to give a little example actually, on when Christine spoke about the disability action plans. Most of the health services that have done a disability action plan now have made sure that the plan itself is accessible to all users or readers. So we have the screen reader technology built in. Some of the health services have been able to have their disability action plan developed into what
we call an easy English or easy read version. So there's simplified language and with some pictures to go with
the language. And then we're also aware that some it's separate to disability action plans in terms of actual wayfinding around hospitals, one of the health services in metropolitan Melbourne has been able to implement the bendy maps, so that I'm sure listeners are aware of indie maps, but they provide a whole lot of information about wayfinding through a hospital, such as where to find lifts or where to find
wayfinding information. So I think they're great initiatives across health services that are really trying to break down some of those barriers that that people who visit hospitals may experience.
Now, Jill will stay with you. Give our listeners a bit of info about where the DLO program primarily operates at the moment.
Yeah, sure. Thanks, Sam. As Christine said, we are in many of the public hospitals around Victoria. We're not in every health service, but we certainly try and cover the state as best we can. So most of the major metropolitan hospitals have a DLO presence, as do the big the regional areas. Sometimes you'll find a DLO in in a place like Kyabram, um and Colac, which would not necessarily be the normal expectation for a program such as this. And they do great work with their local communities and
are very connected. So I was thinking before about how to share information about how to find out about whether your local health service has a DLO, and probably the best way is to go to the home page of your local hospital or health. Service and search for disability liaison officer. And that would probably give you information about whether there is a DLO in your local health service or not, and how to contact them.
All right. Perfect. And, um, could you give some examples, Jill, of where the DLO has worked with some members of the blindness and low vision community in particular?
Yeah, we'd be happy to. I'd probably also.
Worth saying that Delos, in that patient facing role, might be that that person is an inpatient, or that might be that person's at an outpatient trying to come into hospital for to access an appointment. So we would work across the board regardless of where the person is. We can help people navigate the health system. So a couple of examples might be and it talks to how we were referencing the maps before or providing information about wayfinding.
So we think about how communication might be provided to somebody, whether they're in the community or whether they're an inpatient on a ward, and whether that information is accessible to them. And we can speak to the ward staff, or we can speak to the specialist clinics teams and so on around providing information in a way that people can actually access it and find it easily.
Um, we were thinking, too, that there was we've had some.
Scenarios where if someone might have or experienced blindness or low vision, but they may also experience another disability, another disability, such as an intellectual disability or cognitive or sensory disability. And when there's these experiences, the barriers to healthcare can quickly multiply and things can become even more challenging. So things like orientation around a room or a clinic room
or a busy ward is intimidating for everybody. And then if there are additional supports that somebody might require, or that experience might be pretty stressful. So the DLO can help in those kinds of situations to advise or educate the staff that are supporting the patient. We might think about, as Krista mentioned earlier, the care needs or preferences of that person has. And we think about how how those
might be best met in the hospital environment. So we would work directly with the individual and talking to them about what they might need, what kind of orientation they might need around the environment they're in. And we would also communicate with us with the staff members around that person.
So as a situation, I remember where a person lived in a supported residential facility and the staff at that at that house were really concerned that this particular person wasn't going to have their needs met when they came to hospital, because they might have difficulty communicating their needs and because of their blindness. So we worked with the person, the ward staff. We gave them some general orientation and communication strategies. We did things like remind the staff about
where to put the call bill, for example. Really simple things, but could be quite a challenge for an individual. We encourage them, I guess, around supporting that person to mobilize and to feel safe in that ward environment, to get up and go to the toilet and those kinds of things. We checked in directly with the person about what would make them feel more comfortable and safe. And then we made sure that this was written in the care preferences
section of the that person's hospital record. We also have some communication boards at the at the head of a of a patient's bed. So popping some lights up there for the staff to say.
Oh, that's very pleasing to hear the case studies and successful outcomes that the DLS have been able to accomplish in those sort of situations, especially with those intersections between blindness, low vision and, you know, other disabilities there. So that's some quite pleasing for sure. Now, Kristen, I'd like to just come to you now, what are some examples and case studies from your side of things that you'd like to let our listeners know about?
I think probably the Jill's probably covered off on a number of the kind of common, more common ones. I think the patient care preferences, which I mentioned earlier, is probably that. And versions of that across the health network really help that communication between the staff and the patient and understanding, um, those adjustments in care that can really, um, improve the experience for the patient while they're an inpatient or while they're receiving outpatient services.
Well, that's pretty much covered off on everything. So thank you very much, both of you, for that. I've been speaking today with Kristen and Jill from the Disability Liaison Officer Program about how the DLS can help people with various disabilities to access the health services they require in hospital and health care situations. I'm Sam Culley and you're listening to Talking Vision on Vision Australia Radio, associated stations
of RPM and the Community Radio Network. I hope you enjoyed that conversation there with Christine and Jill from the Disability Liaison Officer Program. If you missed any part of that interview, or you'd love to hear from Christine and Jill again, Talking vision will be available on the Vision Australia Radio website at RVA radio.org. That's RVA radio.org. You can also find the program on the podcast app of
your choice or through the Vision Australia library. And now let's find out a little bit more about the January special interest program with Jordan Ashby. I'm here today with Jordan Ashby, volunteer coordinator in New South Wales, and eyesight also involved in the telling program and in particular the upcoming January webinar series, which he'll be hosting quite a few of. Jordan, welcome to Talking Vision. Thank you very much for your time.
Thank you for having me, Sam. As usual.
Now, Jordan, let's some let's get into those webinar series. You've got three coming up in January. So tell us about those.
Yeah. So the webinar series in January is going to be um, it's going to have a focus on, uh, the changing perceptions of blind and low vision people in mainstream media. Um, so we've got some really interesting speakers on that topic. Uh, first off, the ranks will be Alister Lee, who's a is based in Sydney. He's a voiceover artist, and I like to call him the man
of a thousand Voices and accents. So he's a, uh, as I said, a voiceover actor, and he is blind, which I think is what we're trying to sort of get across as well, is that a lot of these, uh, people that are coming well, the three webinar speakers that we've got are blind and low vision people that are changing these perceptions out in mainstream media. So Alister Lee is the first one that we're doing. Second one will be Steph Green, who's a New Zealand based, self-published USA
today prize winning author of over 30 titles. Um, more importantly as well, too, she's going to be speaking to us a little bit about her self-help books around, uh, assisting other authors in self-publishing. Uh, and obviously, as I said, she's blind as well, which provides her a unique insight to, uh, our audience around who may be interested in getting into writing and things like that. Uh, our last speaker for this series is, uh, somewhat of a coup. Uh, his
name is Joe Strick. Uh, he's had a very storied career. Uh, so he started off as a blindness consultant on the Netflix series, uh, Daredevil, uh, where he came in and trained Charlie Cox on how to play the character. He then moved on to become a associate producer on the Apple TV series called sea with, uh, Jason Momoa as the lead. Uh, and he's also an associate producer on
the recent Netflix series, uh, All the Light we Cannot See. Huge, huge advocate for blind and low vision actors and was involved in casting the two main leads for all the light we cannot see.
Now, Jordan, tell us a little bit more about Alastor. Well, would people have heard his voice before? Most likely.
Yeah. So he has like a large portfolio of, uh, TV commercials. Uh, he's sort of dipped his feet into audio description as well. Uh, he's also done a lot of work around sort of TV roles as well, just back up TV roles as well. So he's got a bit of a storied career, done a lot of radio. Yeah.
Oh, cool. And with Steph, she's, um, released quite a few books. She's quite a prolific author, as I understand. What are some sort of books, in particular the self-help titles. But in terms of some famous or like, quite well known titles that she's written? Yeah.
So as I said, she writes, um, gothic romance novels.
Oh, wow.
There you go. So she, uh, under she's under the. Well, she writes under the name of Stephanie Holmes for her actual portfolio of books. So with her sort of books, they, as I said, she found it very, very hard to break into being an author. She was getting knocked back a lot. So she she delved into the publishing, the publishing, self-publishing field, uh, and some of the sort of more recent ones that she's done. Um, she had a title in 2023 called You're So Dead to Me. She's had
Of Mice and Murder, which was the USA today winning book. Oh, wow. Um, so she's got a large sort of list of books. She's got about 30 to 35 books that she's published. Right? Um, so very, very prolific. Um, based in New Zealand, as I've touched on. So the fact that she's gotten so big in the USA is a big coup for her as well. Very, very busy author.
Yeah, it's fantastic news and really great to have these people on the line in January. So looking forward to seeing how that goes. And just before we move on, I think there's some other exciting news with, um, Joe Strecker. One of his shows has actually been nominated for a Golden Globe. So that's quite incredible. And, you know, as you've said, quite a coup. So that's really sort of going gangbusters, hasn't it?
Yeah. So all the light we cannot see was based. It's a four part series directed by Shawn Levy, who, uh, worked on, uh, The Good Guy and is currently working on Daredevil with Ryan Reynolds. So very, very known producer Joe cast Aria Marie Liberty as the lead role in that particular show, which she'd never done acting before. And she's blind and low vision, so she's. Never sort of got into acting. This was just a really sort of her first dip in the water, basically. And she's, uh,
she's starring alongside Mark Ruffalo and, uh, Hugh Laurie. So a very, very, uh, very, very big cast for this Netflix series.
Yeah. No. Yeah. And it's an incredible four part series.
Okay. Uh, four episodes currently on Netflix at the moment. All audio described. And it's based on the prize winning books. All the light we cannot see.
Oh, perfect.
So, um, follows a blind girl in the midst of World War two who, uh, strikes up a connection with a German soldier. And it's a very, very interesting story. I'd encourage anybody who's listening to this to go and watch it on the Netflix series. It's very, very good.
Okay, there you go. All the light. And that's what he's, uh.
He was initially booked for the first, uh, first Monday in January, uh, that we come back, uh, however, I had to move it because that's when the Golden Globes is on. So. Yeah. Right.
There you go. So, um, in regards to that, let's get the dates that these three will be appearing. So, um, we'll start off with Alister. What day and time can people expect to catch up with him.
So the first webinar series now with that change in schedule, is going to be the, uh, 15th of January at 2 p.m., Dallas Daly joining us from Sydney. Uh, the second second webinar with Steph Green is going to be at 2 p.m. on the 22nd, uh, Eastern Standard Time, of course. And the final webinar is now going to be on the 29th of January at 2 p.m. with Joe Straker.
And how can people register to head along to the zoom webinars?
Yeah. So, um, if you're if you were to sort of call up, uh, Vision Australia, you can register up with tele link and they can give you that information. So yeah, if you go over onto the Vision Australia website and you just search for the Summer tele link series, it'll come up with all of our interesting webinars. All right.
Cool. And that website again is Vision australia.org Vision australia.org and search for tell link. Jordan thank you very much for your time today. I've been speaking today with Jordan Ashby, the volunteer coordinator from New South Wales, and I say also responsible for the telling program and facilitator of three exciting upcoming January webinars with three very important people from the blind and low vision community doing incredible things. Jordan,
thank you very much for your time today. It's a pleasure to catch up.
Thank you for having me on again, Sam.
And now here's Francis Kelland with a reader recommended.
Thank you Sam. The book today was the first book in an incredibly successful series, the Outlander series, which went on to become a successful television series as well. The first book in the series is called Cross Stitch, and for those of you who like a good historical fiction, read with a little bit of a time slip happening, you'll enjoy this series and Scottish history as well. Cross-stitch
is by Diana Gabaldon. In 1945, a Claire Randall, a former combat nurse, is back from the war and reunited with her husband on a second honeymoon. Their blissful reunion is shattered when she touches a boulder in one of the ancient stone ruins, and is instantly transported to a Scotland torn by war and raiding border clans in 1743, we'll clear find her way back to her own time. Or is her destiny forever linked with Clan Mackenzie and the gallant James Fraser? Let's hear a sample of Cross-stitch,
part one in the Diana Gabaldon Outlander series. It's narrated by Denise Kirby.
It wasn't a very likely place for disappearances, at least at first glance. Mrs. Baird's was like a thousand other Highland bed and breakfast establishments in 1946, clean and quiet with fading floral wallpaper, gleaming floors and a coin operated water heater in the bathroom. Mrs. Baird herself was squat and easygoing, and made no objection to Frank lining her tiny rose sprig parlour with the dozens of books and papers with which he always travelled. I met Mrs. Baird
in the front hall. On my way out. She stopped me with a pudgy hand on my arm and patted at my hair. Dear me, Mrs. Randall, you kind of go out like that here. Just let me tuck that bit in for you there. That's better. You know, my cousin was telling me about a new perm. She tried, comes out beautiful and holds like a dream. Perhaps you
should try that kind next time. I hadn't the heart to tell her that the waywardness of my light brown curls was strictly the fault of nature, and not due to any dereliction on the part of the permanent wave manufacturers. Her own tightly marked celled waves suffered from no such perversity. Yes, I'll do that, Mrs. Baird, I lied. I'm just going down to meet Frank. We'll be back for tea.
And that was Cross-stitch, part one in the Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon. And there are all of the books in the series in the collection. It's quite a long series and it has so many fans, so if you would like to get that book or any other of the wonderfully long series that we have in the collection, or short books, short stories, anything you're after, give the library a call on 1300 654 656. That's one 306 54656. Or you can email library at Vision Australia. Org that's library
at Vision Australia. Org.
And now, finally, before we go, some news and information on behalf of the Australian blind and Low Vision community Vision Australia wish to pay tribute to the life and achievements and recognise the outstanding community contributions of Doctor Kevin
Moffatt OAM. Over the course of his life, Kevin created a lasting legacy for his contributions to Vision Australia, Blind Citizens Australia, World Blind Union, Asia Pacific and numerous other areas and initiatives that have had direct and positive impact for the blind and low vision community. Prior to the formation of Vision Australia, Kevin served as Vice President of the Royal Victorian Institute for the blind. He also gave 12 years of dedicated service on the board of Vision Australia,
including ten years as chair. Kevin was also a director on the Disability Services Board of the Victorian State Government, and in 2006 he was conferred his Doctor of Philosophy from Deakin University, with his research focusing on diversity and employment. In 2002, Kevin received a Human Rights Award from the Australian Human Rights Commission for contributing to the Disability Discrimination Act. In 2017, Kevin was awarded an OAM for his extensive
service to the blindness and low vision community. Ron Horton, Vision Australia CEO, said Kevin would be remembered as a pillar of the disability community across Australia and the world. Today is a sad day for our community. Not only was Kevin instrumental in the formation of Vision Australia, his years of selfless service across the blind and low vision community have had a massive impact that will never be forgotten,
Ron said. From everyone at Vision Australia, we offer our condolences to Kevin's family and friends and our thoughts are with them, he said. And that's all we have time for today. You've been listening to Talking Vision. Talking vision is a production of Vision Australia Radio. Thanks to all involved with putting the show together. And remember we love your feedback and comments. So please do get in touch on Talking Vision at Vision australia.org. That's talking vision all.
One word at Vision australia.org. But until next week it's Sam Culley saying bye for now.
You can contact Virgin Australia by phoning us anytime during business hours on one 308 4746. That's one 384 746 or by visiting Vision australia.org. That's Vision Australia call.