Welcome to the latest edition of the HSA newsletter, Connections. 

The next meetings will be held on the following dates,please keep an eye on our facebook page and website hydrocephalus.org.au for further information

• Brisbane – Saturday 11/2/2023 @ 2pm – 4pm. Location: Virtual. See the Facebook Group for further updates. 

• Melbourne – Sunday 12/2/2023 @ 2pm – 4pm. Hawthorn Library Room 1

• Sydney AGM – Sunday 26/2/2023 @1:45pm. First Ermington Scout Hall (367 Kissing Point Road (cnr Bartlett Street), Ermington NSW 2115). Please note members and visitors must enter via the Bartlett Street gate. The AGM will be followed by the quarterly general meeting at 2:45pm.

Our Sydney meeting is the AGM, thanks to the changes made to the constitution last year this meeting will be held both in person and online which will for the first time give members who are not physically able to be present a way to participate in the meeting.

The following positions will be available and if you are interested in running for a position then please complete a Nomination Form and follow the steps on the form to submit it to the Secretary. It is possible to do most roles committee roles remotely however the welfare officers must be a resident of the state its in and the public officer must reside in NSW.

• President

• Vice President

• Secretary - Click here to view Position Description

• Treasurer

• Newsletter Editor

• Social Media

• Committee Member

• Committee Member

• Welfare Chair

• Welfare Officer(s) per state

• Public Officer

Patient Reported Outcome Measurements, the HSA continues to work with the shunt registry on the development of these outcome measures. We are looking at using a World Health Organisation survey called the WHOQOL which is a survey used to measure quality of life for a population. It covers the domains of bodily states and functions, psychological functions, levels of independence, social relationships and environment. 

The current state of the project is a costing to see the magnitude of what it costs, this cost is unfortunately not covered by the government funding so there may be a need for support from the HSA either financially or by supporting a fundraising campaign. If we are approached by the NSA this will be discussed by the committee.

Would you like to support the HSA? There are a number of easy ways to do so. The first is to buy some under pressure for hydro merchandise at https://underpressureforhydro.org.au/shop. Another easy way is to start a Facebook fundraiser, how you can do so is:

1. Login to Facebook on a desktop

2.  On the left-hand side click on fundraisers (you may have to click see more if you have not recently run a fundraiser)

3. On the left-hand side click raise money

4. Click charity and type “the hydrocephalus support association” and select us.

5. Enter your goal for the fundraiser and set the currency to Australian dollars.

6. Click create

7. Share the fundraiser with your friends on Facebook.

Finally, I hope you all had a pleasant new year and I look forward to speaking to many of you during the year.

Andrew Garde

President, HSA