Su, Jiunn-Yih
Leach, Amanda Jane
Cass, Alan
Morris, Peter Stanley
Kong, Kelvin
Funding for this research was provided by:
Australian Government
Northern Territory Government
Balnaves Foundation
Article History
Received: 14 March 2023
Accepted: 16 October 2023
First Online: 31 October 2023
Declarations
:
: Ethics approval to conduct this study was obtained from Human Research Ethics Committee of the NT Department of Health and the Menzies School of Health Research (#2018–3264) and Central Australian Human Research Ethics Committee (#CA-19–3308). The need for informed consent was waived by the Ethics Committee of the NT Department of Health and the Menzies School of Health Research and Central Australian Human Research Ethics Committee. This research did not involve any human embryos, gametes, and stem cells, and all methods were carried out in accordance with relevant guidelines and regulations.<b>First Nation’s considerations</b>The Aboriginal sub-committees to the Human Research Ethics Committees (where we obtained ethics approval for conducting the study), which has right of veto, approved the study. The concept and written research plan for this research was reviewed, and the final version of the manuscript was presented to the Australian First Nations Reference Group (AFNRG) of the Child Health Division, Menzies School of Health Research, which also provided comments and suggestions the authors used to improve the manuscript.This data analysis is a part of the analysis plan for a Stepped Wedge Cluster Randomised Trial of ear and hearing workforce enhancement in twenty remote communities (twelve serviced by the NT Government and eight by Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations),<sup>21</sup> which was also approved by these Ethics Committees and Aboriginal sub-committees and was reviewed by the AFNRG.<b>Participant consultation</b>Community consultation was initially at local authority and council meetings, and other leadership and stakeholder group meetings made face to face and on-country wherever possible, by the principal investigator of the Trial (AJL). The Board of the Aboriginal Medical Services Alliance NT (AMSANT) was regularly consulted during the co-design development phase. Fully executed Participation Agreements with twenty communities included approval of data release for purposes of measuring the study outcomes, and this included retrospective analysis (this manuscript) and 6-monthly prospective cascade analysis.<b>Governance</b>The Trial is co-Chaired by a First Nations Worumi man, Professor Kelvin Kong (one of the co-authors of this manuscript). The Advisory Board to the trial is chaired and co-chaired by senior First Nations leaders in health and education (Dr John Paterson and Ms Jody Dixon), and the Integration Working Group is chaired by senior Indigenous health researcher, Dr Sean Taylor. Each of the twenty communities has a Community Reference Group to provide cultural advice and ensure good communication about the trial in each community, and ensure the trial is culturally safe and conducted according to local cultural protocols.
: Not applicable.
: All investigators declare no financial or competing interests for the study.