Kinship Carers Victoria podcast series

Deep breathing and meditation can provide you with a sense of calm, peace and balance that can benefit your emotional wellbeing and overall health through reducing stress. The podcast features an interview with Eliza Terry, from YogaLiving. Eliza has been teaching Iyengar Yoga since 1998, and teaches mindfulness meditation, with a strong focus on breath work for relaxation. The podcast also includes interviews with two carers who share details of their own experiences with trying relaxation and breathing techniques.

There's a lot of information currently available about how, what and when to eat, and some of it can be quite overwhelming and confusing. In this podcast Kinship Carers Victoria speaks with clinical nutritionist and functional medicine practitioner Nikki Valentini, director of SuperNature Nutrition https://supernature.com.au/. Nikki explains how certain foods and nutrients have been shown to help us deal better with stress and anxiety while other types of foods and eating patterns have been linked to increases in these feelings - and even to other psychological issues and illness. The podcast also includes interviews with carers who share their relationship to food and some of their dietary patterns.

Carers often mention their isolation but many of them have not developed strategies or networks to assist them in overcoming these feelings. This podcast - as part of Kinship Care Week 2022 - provides suggestions for kinship carers on how they can form meaningful connections with friends, family, neighbours and the community to help them support their own physical and psychological wellbeing.

Sandy Pitcher, Secretary of the Department of Families Fairness and Housing, speaks about the effects of Covid-19 on DFFH staff health and wellbeing and the extra workload involved as well as what strategies the department is putting in place to support both kinship carers and DFFH staff in surviving the Covid-19 pandemic. This includes providing information and materials about vaccination consent for children and the accessibility and efficacy of vaccinations and rapid antigen tests. KCV Director Anne McLeish also shares her thoughts on the exceptional efforts from the public sector during this time and how staff within have extended their support of families in directions never thought necessary before.

In this podcast, KCV speaks to one of the country's leaders in the field, consultant paediatrician Associate Professor Margie Danchin, from  Murdoch Childrens Research Institute (MCRI). Margie is also an immunisation expert with over ten years of experience in vaccine research and clinical work, both in Australia and in resource poor settings. She answers common questions and concerns kinship carers and others in the community may have around the vaccines

In this podcast, KCV spoke to psychologist, lecturer and researcher Dr Melissa Weinberg, an Honorary Fellow from the Dept of Psychology at Deakin University with expertise in the science of wellbeing and resilience. Melissa speaks about the need for carers to monitor their own physical and emotional state and needs.

Director of Kinship Carers Victoria (KCV) Anne McLeish talks about the challenges faced by kinship carers during the COVID-19 lockdown and how they and the young people in their care have been coping.

In this podcast on sleep and wellbeing, KCV spoke to psychologist Dr Melissa Weinberg, Honorary Fellow from the Dept of Psychology at Deakin University. Dr Weinberg discusses the effects sleeping poorly or well can have on a person's physical and psychological health and suggests tips on how carers can improve their patterns of sleep and those of the children or young people in their care.

Dr Sanjiv Chopra is a professor of medicine at the Harvard Medical School, a best-selling author and sought-after motivational speaker, who is often referred to as a ‘happiness guru’. In an episode of The Bucket Podcast (at thebucket.com) broadcast on 10 October 2019, Dr Chopra spoke about his book, The Two Most Important Days: How to Find Your Purpose and Live a Happy and Healthy Life. This KCV podcast draws both on the contents of his book and that Bucket Podcast to present evidence on how happiness can be a choice in our lives.

Kinship Carers Victoria recently released the eight report on their longitudinal study of kinship carer families. In this podcast, Director of KCV Anne McLeish discusses why the study was established as well as providing an analysis of the latest report findings, which show that, for the most part, kinship care arrangements for the families in the study continue to be stable.

The health of children in kinship care is of primary concern. Resources must continually be put into finding ways to improve health care outcomes for children in out of home care. In this podcast KCV speaks with Dr Karen McLean pediatrician with the Pathway to Good Health Clinic, the Sleep Disorders Clinic, the Royal Children's Hospital, the Murdoch Children's Research Institute and the Department of Pediatrics with the University of Melbourne.

Grandparents Victoria has just released a report of a survey titled 'The Roles That Grandparents Play'. Director of GPV, Anne McLeish, speaks about the reason for conducting the survey and about the findings, which highlight the varying roles grandparents play within Victorian families and the community.

Thanks to the Victorian Government’s new program of support for kinship carers, 30 new kinship care specialists have been employed to support and speak with carers throughout the state. This podcast features snapshots of discussions taken from a recent seminar held to enable carers to meet those kinship care specialists.

With the Federal Election inching closer, Director of KCV Anne McLeish spoke about how the organisation works to influence politicians' thinking about kinship care.

With elections, both state and federal approaching, Director of Kinship Carers Victoria Anne McLeish speaks about KCV's campaign priorities. CEO of Shepparton FamilyCare David Tennant also discusses issues relating to families, children and welfare and where improvements can be made.

In this podcast Director of Kinship Carers Victoria (KCV) Anne McLeish discusses how education is a key factor in ensuring positive outcomes for children as they mature into adults. KCV believes children have the right to a high-quality education that ensures all students experience success at school. This has lead KCV to call for reinforcement of the capacity of the state’s Lookout Education Support Centres in their efforts to support children and young people in out-of-home care. Murray Geddes, Principal of the Lookout Centre for the South Eastern Victoria Region, also explains the role the centres play and how kinship carers and the children in their care can benefit.

This podcast again addresses the issue of carer wellbeing. Director of Kinship Carers Victoria (KCV) Anne McLeish talks about how KCV works to better protect and promote carer wellbeing and about the various projects KCV employs to do so. We visit one of KCV's artist-in-residence sessions and talk to participants and coordinators about the value of the experience.

With a view to the forthcoming state election in November of this year, Grandparents Victoria / Kinship Carers Victoria has this week released a log of claims against which the organisation will judge the commitment to families of all the candidates standing in the election. Anne McLeish, director of GPV/KCV talks today about how the log of claims, covering areas such as children’s rights, education, family welfare and health was developed. This podcast also includes an interview with Barbara Champion, Director of Play Australia, the peak national advocacy organisation for play in this country.

This podcast, the second in a series of 12, addresses the issue of carer wellbeing. Director of Kinship Carers Victoria (KCV) Anne McLeish talks about why the physical and emotional health of kinship carers and their access to support services is so important and how KCV works to better protect and promote carer wellbeing. Two kinship carers also speak about their personal and professional perspectives on this key element of kinship care.

Today’s program, the first in a series of 12 to be produced and published online over the next year, features an interview with Anne McLeish, Director of Kinship Carers Victoria, or KCV. Anne talks today about the aims of this podcast series, plus the mission and scope of activities of KCV, and she touches briefly on the range of issues facing both carers and the children in their care which will be addressed throughout this series.