On Monday 19 August 2024, BreastScreen Victoria launched its first Disability Action Plan at the Monash BreastScreen at Moorabbin Hospital in Bentleigh East. The Plan creates a pathway to enhance disability inclusion in service delivery, recruitment and staff learning and development, benefiting clients with disability, and the organisation and its staff more broadly.
Over 4.4 million people in Australia have disability. To ensure that BreastScreen Victoria is effectively addressing the challenges and barriers that people with disability face when interacting with the service, they have sought the expertise of Get Skilled Access to help create their first Disability Action Plan.
“As an organisation that values innovation, equitable access, and inclusion, we pride ourselves on meeting our clients' needs. For this reason, we set up a working group to help guide this work, which included representation from clients, staff, and sector partners to address the challenges faced by people with disability when using our service. Their input has been invaluable in creating our Disability Action Plan." says Rita Butera, BreastScreen Victoria CEO.
During this community consultation a clear message was heard; the BreastScreen Victoria service still has a way to go when it comes to catering its service to people with disability, but there is an immense willingness and motivation to learn and adjust where needed.
Annie Fisher, a member of the Consumer Advisory Group and the DAP working group, says: “I have always found the radiographers extremely professional and gentle. They ask what I am capable of, in terms of how long I can maintain arequired positions for. It’s a delicate balance of getting the images needed for the breast screen, and understanding I may not be able to hold positions myself in certain ways for a long time with my disability. I wish for every person with disability to have the same safe & respectful experiences as I have had. I joined the consumer network to advocate for the importance of breast screening and also to offer lived experience with of disability to help improve breast screening services. Through my involvement in this work, it’s clear toI can clearly see the priority BreastScreen Victoria places on providing equitable access to the service. From executives, to service staff; the organisation is willing to seek feedback and listen to advance the rights of people of with disability across the community.”
To read the Disability Action Plan visit breastscreen.org.au/DAP