Street health: Practitioner service provision for Maori homeless people in Auckland

Abstract

Drawing insights from interviews with Maori homeless people, health professionals, and relevant local and international literatures, this chapter focuses on the provision of medical care to homeless people. In particular, we propose that health services orientate to accommodate the worldviews and circumstances of Maori homeless people. Below we consider colonialism and societal developments that have led to homelessness among Maori today. We then present a case study of ‘Grant’, which was compiled from common aspects of various Maori homeless people who access health services at the Auckland City Mission (ACM); an organisation with a long history of catering to the needs and hopes of dispossessed groups, providing food, clothing, advocacy, social and health services. The relational orientation of healthcare at the ACM is discussed, and leads to an exploration of ‘judgement-free service space’ for meeting client needs (cf., Trussell & Mair, 2010). Lastly, we focus on how health professionals can respond to the multiple healthcare needs of Maori homeless people, in partnership with social services.