Supporting Aboriginal fathers during pregnancy and birth is the focus of new research being rolled out in Western Australia.
Dr Bernardo Dewey from the Indigenous Health Research Program at Curtin University’s Medical School was awarded one of three Early-to-Mid Career Research Fellowships to undertake this work, jointly funded by the WA Government’s Future Health Research and Innovation (FHRI) Fund and The Hospital Research Foundation Group.
Dr Dewey will work with Aboriginal Elders, fathers and healthcare workers to help strengthen Aboriginal men’s involvement in antenatal care – leading to better outcomes for both parents and babies.
The four-year project will explore why Aboriginal fathers are sometimes not engaged in the antenatal care process, and how this can be improved through greater engagement and more culturally appropriate communication.
“We will be interviewing Aboriginal families and healthcare practitioners from both urban and regional areas, working along Aboriginal midwifery teams at King Edward Memorial, Rockingham General Hospital and Armadale Health Services and working in partnership with Gorenang Moortabiin Aboriginal Corporation in Albany,” Dr Dewey said.
“Currently we can access a significant amount of data about the health and experiences of the mums but not a lot from the dads’ perspective.
“We aim to co-design an Aboriginal-specific tool that helps with engaging and educating Aboriginal dads in the antenatal care period. The intervention will be aimed at Aboriginal families, midwives and other healthcare workers.”
Dr Dewey’s research is being supervised by Rohan Collard, Principal Investigator at the Ngangk Yira Institute for Change, Professor Rhonda Marriott AM from Murdoch University and Prof. Carrington Shepherd from Curtin University.
It draws on more than two years of extensive consultation with Aboriginal Elders, Aboriginal‑led academics, healthcare practitioners and Aboriginal fathers.
Identifying this area of unmet need came from a forum Dr Dewey convened alongside Mr Collard in 2025 that focused on Aboriginal men’s health. The forum led to an advisory group being set up, that Dr Dewey said had helped shape his research direction.
Dr Dewey said he had also engaged midwifery teams, who were very keen to see the tool developed.
He said recruitment for the study would begin in July this year, following consultation with the ethics committee within the WA Department of Health.
Dr Dewey said that the multi-year funding guarantee was life-changing – allowing him to make real change in such a vulnerable cohort, which could only happen with this sort of investment.
“I’m beyond grateful to The Hospital Research Foundation Group and the WA Government for being afforded the privilege of being able to conduct this important and needed research full-time, free from worrying about job security,” he said.
“This Fellowship project is just a start, but it will lay the foundation for future evidence‑based change that has the potential to help close the gap in Aboriginal parental and newborn health outcomes by improving the way we engage with Aboriginal dads in health settings.”
