Aboriginal drug service workers' experience of family therapy

There is a growing recognition that culturally congruent approaches in the area of Indigenous health and education are needed. However, there are few detailed accounts of what factors contribute to providing sufficient cultural safety so that services are accessible and able to provide effective interventions. This book makes a significant contribution to these areas of inquiry through exploring the contribution of family therapy and family therapy training to those working in the field of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander substance misuse. Workers, often at odds with mainstream interventions found that family therapy could provide a culturally relevant means of approaching Aboriginal substance misuse through its contextual and relational view of problems. Important to the engagement of the drug service workers with family therapy as a modality was the processes by which it was imparted.The training utilised a powerful pedagogical approach that provided a corrective educational experience for many of the participants. This work will be of interest to all those seeking strategies to`close the gap' for Indigenous people in the fields of health, education and research.