Koori Maternity Service Guidelines and Minimum Dataset Review
Victorian Department of Health
Who funded the project
Koori Maternity Services are a vital part of Victoria’s maternity system, providing culturally safe, holistic, and community-based care for Aboriginal women, non-Aboriginal women having Aboriginal babies, and their families. Delivered across 14 sites (11 through Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations (ACCHOs) and three through public hospitals), KMS offers care that goes beyond clinical support.
Karabena Consulting undertook a statewide consultation process with KMS midwives, service managers, hospital staff, educators, and policy makers to explore how the current Guidelines and MDS were being used, identify gaps in service coordination, and generate practical suggestions for improving culturally safe maternity care. The review surfaced systemic disconnects and highlighted opportunities to centre cultural safety, workforce sustainability, and Aboriginal models of care within the broader maternity system.
Summary
The main aims of the project were to:
Assess the relevance, utility, and uptake of the existing KMS Guidelines and MDS.
Identify barriers to implementation and opportunities for strengthening cultural safety.
Understand the experiences of the KMS workforce in delivering flexible, intensive support.
Provide clear, practice-based considerations to inform future revisions of the Guidelines and MDS.
Project Aims
To achieve the project’s aims, Karabena undertook a culturally grounded consultation process designed to centre the voices of those delivering and supporting Koori Maternity Services across Victoria. We:
used a culturally safe, strengths-based approach grounded in Indigenous ways of working
included KMS midwives, Aboriginal health workers, educators, managers, and system-level staff in focus groups and interviews
reached participants from metro, regional, and rural areas across Victoria
used visual tools like Mural and live note-taking to support trust, safety, and transparency
analysed the data thematically, drawing out common issues, patterns, and suggestions
Methodologies
Outputs
Karabena delivered a detailed evaluation report structured around the eight current KMS Guideline objectives. The report synthesised participant insights, identified overarching issues, and presented targeted considerations for updating the Guidelines and MDS.
We also presented the findings of the report to VACCHO, members of the KMS workforce, and the Department of Health.
The review identified several key areas for improvement and system change. These outcomes reflect what participants shared about the realities of delivering Koori Maternity Services and align directly with the project’s aims. They offer grounded, practice-based insights that will help inform future revisions of the Guidelines and Minimum Dataset.
Cultural safety: Highlighted systemic racism in hospital settings and called for shared responsibility for cultural safety across the health system.
Workforce sustainability: Identified burnout risks and gaps in access to supervision, onboarding, and professional development.
Data and accountability: Exposed the invisibility of KMS work in hospital systems and recommended integration of secure, culturally relevant data tools.
Service integration: Found significant disconnection between KMS and hospitals, and proposed formal protocols to improve collaboration and continuity.
System reform: Challenged assumptions that Western maternity standards are the benchmark and repositioned Aboriginal models of care as foundational.
Project Outcomes
Aboriginal maternity care
Koori Maternity Services
Cultural safety
Indigenous workforce
Perinatal health
System reform
Data sovereignty
Community-led care
Health equity
Karabena Consulting