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Event on 15 April, 2021

Homebound survey: release of the preliminary report

Making the invisible visible: exploring the experiences of frail, homebound and bedridden people.

Globally, people who are homebound are largely invisible, being socially isolated and overlooked in service provision.

In Australia, our primary healthcare system is based around attendance at consultations. This is a barrier to healthcare for Frail, Homebound and Bedridden People (FHBP), who are further disadvantaged by then not having the medical reports needed to access welfare, disability and other services.

ME/CFS South Australia, ME/CFS Australia and Ricky Buchanan collaborated with researchers from Flinders University to design a survey to draw out the experiences of homebound Australians.

The survey is part of a broader project under the shared leadership of researcher, Dr Maria Alejandra Piñero de Plaza, and our Chair, Penelope McMillan. Ricky Buchanan authored the report that instigated this project of developing innovative digital solutions for people who are homebound in Australia and beyond.

This preliminary report describes the statistics drawn from the survey. It also includes lots of great photographs that were submitted as part of the survey!

The survey sought to better understand people's experiences. This qualitative material will be explored in later reports.

Report

To read the preliminary report, you can either:

  • scroll down on the right-hand side of the embedded report below
  • click on the Download button at the bottom of the embedded image

Conference presentation

On 18 March 2021, Dr Maria Alejandra Piñero de Plaza, Penelope McMillan and Ricky Buchanan made a conference presentation about the Frail, Homebound and Bedridden People project.

Highlighting the Unseen includes information about the presentation, a poster that was prepared for the conference, and the video (2:20mins), Highlighting the Unseen: Frail, Homebound and Bedridden People.

Updates

Find out more about this research at Flinders Caring Futures Institute, 29 April 2021.

Check out the video from 28 September 2021, Unheard and Marginalised, in the Australian Health Journal.

Last edited: 28 September, 2021