Natural Helper

Natural Helper – The Natural Helper Approach to Culturally Responsive Chronic Disease Management

The Natural Helper Program aims to facilitate consumer engagement with self-management by embedding culture-specific peer mentors with lived experience of chronic disease into existing health services. In this implementation and effectiveness clinical trial (cluster randomised controlled trial), chronic disease clinics (n=18) in Sydney and Melbourne will be allocated to immediate (active arm) or delayed implementation (control arm). Active arms will be supported to adopt the mentor program alongside usual care, while control clusters will continue with usual care. In active arms, trained mentors will provide culture-specific mentoring to patients from CALD communities for up to 6-months. Following the implementation, outcomes from consecutive patients who identify with a culturally diverse background attending each clinic will be assessed using questionnaires recording their change in ‘activation’ for self-management (main outcome), chronic disease self-efficacy, coping and quality of life (secondary outcomes).

We will also evaluate how well the program was implemented to allow the results to directly influence clinical practice. This research has the potential to reduce inequities experienced by culturally diverse communities by optimising people’s chronic disease self-management.