The video is aimed at helping spread the important message about looking after Aboriginal women’s heart health.

“Making Messages: protecting the hearts of women we love” is a three-minute film featuring local Aboriginal women talking about their experiences with heart attacks and related issues, was produced by film maker Lou Glover as part of a Heart Foundation Community Grant project.

Heart Foundation NSW Women and Heart Disease manager Angela Hehir said that given the shocking statistics around women and heart disease, especially in Aboriginal women, it was important to develop resources that were useful and appropriate for the community.

“We were inspired to award this grant because of the way it used real stories as a way of making women more aware of what signs and symptoms to look out for and how to reduce their risk of a heart attack,” she said.

“With rates of heart disease among Indigenous women significantly higher than non-Indigenous women and hospitalisation rates being three times higher among Indigenous women, it’s vital that we work closely with the community to find the best way to help women better look after their heart health.”

What was unique about the video was the idea to involve the children and grandchildren of the local Aboriginal women in delivering the heart health messages through the creation of signs and posters that were featured in the video.

"Writer Shanna Provost came up with the idea of kids and signs because of the importance of children and family in our Koori communities,” Lou Glover said. “If heart health truth needs to get out to our women, we figured that our kids are a draw card and motivator.”

The video was part of a women and heart disease community awareness campaign in the Eurobodalla and Bega Valley Shires, which also saw local women create artwork featured in a series of postcards as well as community forums for local women.

The project team was driven by a strong commitment to improve long term heart health outcomes for women, particularly Aboriginal women, as they are dying decades before non-Aboriginal women from diseases that are preventable.

Aunty Hazel Moreton, Lou Glover, Annie Flint, Tashe Long, Gabrielle Powell and Ngaire Gordon were the local workers who got together and dreamed up this project, which included the making of this DVD as well as holding health forums, art workshops and street stalls to raise awareness of heart health for women.

The video, postcards and other resources from the project will be distributed to local service providers and to the public through community health centres and GP practices.

The project was a collaboration between the following organisations: