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Hands on Health Australia (HOHA) aims to assist communities to improve the delivery of health and other services to marginalised people, utilising the resource of community volunteers.
The work of HOHA occurs both in Australia and around the world. Volunteers work in communities providing various therapies and services to those who would be otherwise unable to access them.
These services include; chiropractic, dentistry, dermatology, general medicine, hairdressing, massage, naturopathy, nursing, physiotherapy, podiatry, psychology and legal advice, just to name a few.
The life of Jesus Christ inspires the work of HOHA. ‘Hands On’ embodies the philosophy of healing people through hands.
However Hands on Health is a non-religious organisation.
Beyond providing healthcare on a physical level, HOHA seeks to promote self esteem and restore human dignity by encouraging people to discover their self worth and solutions to their problems.
Health education and health promotion is an integral part of the HOH programes in clinics and communities throughout the world.
The founder of the Australian Hands on Health, Dr Dein Vindigni, a Melbourne chiropractor, whilst on a study tour with Community Aid Abroad in 1987 met Moira Kelly at one of the worlds busiest, most crowded rail stations, Howrah Station in Calcutta, home to thousands of people. Moira had gathered around her many of Howrah’s derelict children, and cared for them. Moira even managed to persuade a team of doctors and nurses to set up practice at the Howrah Station. The urgent cases were admitted to the hospital. It was from this sight of a clinic at a train station that Dr Vindigni found his inspiration to start a clinic caring for the needy in Melbourne by taking the service to the places that the people called home.
The work of Moira Kelly, one of the patrons of HOHA was an inspiration to Dein in Melbourne. Moira had spent time with Mother Teresa in Calcutta in the 1980s working with the “poorest of the poor” in that city of teeming millions. For the past 20 years her mission has been the rescue and physical, mental and emotional recovery of children orphaned, maimed or traumatised by war, neglect, abuse, poverty or political turmoil especially in the combat zones of Asia and Europe.
On Dein’s return to Melbourne he spoke to Father Ernie Smith a parish priest at Sacred Heart, St Kilda, and founder of the Sacred Heart Mission in 1981, and shared the idea of establishing a clinic in the heart of the need. Fr Ernie was receptive to Dein’s idea and in 1989 the first official Hands On Health clinic was set up in a small room beneath the stairs in the Mission headquarters building. Here Dr Vindigni began offering chiropractic treatment to those who visited the Mission.
It was from these beginnings that the birth of the organisation that now has a number of independent clinics and projects under its umbrella that is now known as Hands on Health Australia began.
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