"It's Been Like a Spiritual Awakening for Me" - Listening to the Voices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women About Traumatic Brain Injury from Violence

Speaker: Dr Michelle Fitts
Senior Research Fellow, Menzies School of Health Research

Presentation 1: Dr Michelle Fitts & Elaine Wills

"It's Been Like a Spiritual Awakening for Me": Listening to the Voices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women About Traumatic Brain Injury from Violence 

Women who survive physical violence to the head or non-fatal strangulation are at significant risk of traumatic brain injury (TBI). This presentation will share personal and family accounts from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women about violence-related TBI. It will explore the impact of these injuries on daily life, as well as the factors that influence their decisions around accessing and engaging with healthcare. The presentation will outline a range of recommendations for creating more responsive and culturally appropriate service systems to better support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women who have experienced this injury and their families.

Presentation 2: Rebecca He

Despite growing awareness of intimate partner violence related brain injury, the cognitive consequences of this physical violence remain unclear. This presentation will share findings from a systematic review and meta-analysis that investigated the cognitive outcomes of physical abuse from intimate partner violence (IPV). We examined the differences in overall cognitive performance between women with and without experiences of physical IPV, and also explored these differences across the cognitive domains of executive function, attention, and memory.

Join the Seminar via the Zoom link here.