Deaf people’s access to preventative and on-going healthcare information

This qualitative study was conducted from August 2011-July 2012 to investigate access to health care information for Deaf Auslan users throughout Australia. A participatory approach was used - the study was designed collaboratively with a team of Deaf research assistants to create a demographic survey, checklist and series of interview questions for interviews to be conducted in Auslan. A process of purposeful sampling was adopted, whereby the Deaf research assistants identified Auslan users in their local communities who were able to talk about access to health care information from their own experience. In total, 72 interviews were conducted with Deaf Auslan users across all six states and also in the Australian Capital Territory. The interview data was translated into English and annotated for key themes using ELAN annotation software.