AAIMH WA Event:

Culturally Safe Perinatal Mental Health Care 

ABOUT THE SEMINAR 
This seminar explores how culturally safe perinatal mental health care can protect and promote infants’ social and emotional wellbeing by centring their experience within diverse families and communities in Western Australia. It examines how the mother-infant dyad may experience ‘attachment’ across different ethnocultural contexts. In acknowledging the impact of migration, trauma, systemic disadvantage and perinatal distress on the caregiver/mother, we can better understand how the wellbeing of the infant - a relational partner, is not only shaped by situation and care systems, but also by ethnocultural norms and values. 

 
PRESENTERS 

Kelli Jones 
Social Worker and Perinatal Programme Coordinator 

Kelli is a social worker who has spent the past 3.5 years coordinating the Perinatal Mental Health Programme at Ishar, walking alongside women from ethnoculturally and linguistically diverse (ELD) communities in Perth as they navigate pregnancy and early parenting. She offers individual perinatal social work support and facilitates parenting groups for new mothers from diverse backgrounds. Over the past 15 years Kelli has provided psychosocial support across government and non-government sectors in the UK and Australia, and has also volunteered in refugee camps in Greece and France. Kelli has a strong commitment to social justice and is particularly dedicated to ensuring that ELD mothers receive equitable, culturally safe and trauma informed support during the perinatal period. 

 
Dr. Bernadette Wright 
Clinical Psychologist 

Bernadette is a clinical psychologist, educator, and consultant specialising in the nuances of transcultural mental health processes that occur between service providers and service recipients. Her work focuses on understanding the interrelationship of resettlement, mental health and ethnocultural issues for migrants and refugees that would impede effective clinical engagement.  Bernadette’s career encompasses clinical and capacity building work with individuals and families from ELD backgrounds and providing advice to government and community groups. Having delivered numerous culturally responsive training seminars and workshops that underscore the interface between ethnicity, culture and mental health, she has also developed resources aimed at facilitating the transcultural process in service delivery. Bernadette’s collaboration in transcultural action research has led to publications in peer reviewed journals. 

 
DATE: 24^th March 2026 
TIME: 6pm-8pm (AWST) 
VENUE: Online and In-person @ the Herdsman Lake Discovery Centre, Cnr Flynn and Selby Street, Wembley WA. 
REGISTRATION: https://www.trybooking.com/DJYHD 

 In-person registration closes 17th March 2026. Online tickets available until 5pm (AWST) 23rd March 2026.