The medicalization of aboriginal children: a comparison of the lengths of hospital-stay of aboriginal and non-aboriginal children in Western Australia and the Northern Territory.

This paper compares the lengths of hospital-stay of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal children in Western Australia and the Northern Territory over the past few years. The comparison yields two trends: Aboriginal children stay longer in hospital than do non-Aboriginal children; within each racial group, children stay longer in hospital in the Northern Territory than in Western Australia. By-and-large, these trends continue irrespective of age, sex, diagnostic category, hospital and usual place of residence. It appears that factors in addition to high rates of infectious disease, severity of illness and remoteness of home address affect length of hospital stay. Two organizational factors are suggested: the latent, working logic of service institutions such as public hospitals and the tendency of government to institutionalize impoverished people. It is concluded however, that as health care becomes holistic and more the responsibility of Aboriginal people, there is every reason to predict a decrease in the lengths of hospital stay of Aboriginal children.