A survey of drought-stricken health patients indicates a dire feeling of being forgotten among communities, as new crises demand attention away from their suffering.
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Conducted by children's health organisation Royal Far West over February and March, the Drought Impact Survey 2020, stemmed from a realisation that young people's health is often a reflection of the family's stresses.
"We have seen for quite some time the increase in referrals to us from drought-affected areas and we've seen the complexity in cases increasing," said Jacqui Emery, business director at Royal Far West.
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The Manly-based service on average sees up to 40 patients a week travelling from all over the state, but predominately from the Riverina and Central West.
Anecdotally, Ms Emery said, that in the past 18 months, the number of clients coming through requiring psychiatric assessment had quadrupled.
"There are real stresses going on and their compounding the longer the drought goes on," Ms Emery said.
"It's impacting on the health of parents. We're finding an increase in parents presenting with mental health issues, and that's hard enough on a family let alone when you're also caring for a child with developmental issues."
In the wake of the drought, the bushfires and now the COVID-19 pandemic, Ms Emery expressed concerns that towns around the region could be experiencing a "community depression or trauma".
"A lot of families have said to us how great it is that the bushfire-affected communities have had so much money raised for them," Ms Emery said.
"But what about us, they say, we don't want to be forgotten. We often say that in those situations, children are the silent sufferers of the drought.
"It's important we keep it on the radar to not let the communities and the drought be forgotten."
The worldwide health crisis is also affecting how readily Royal Far West can manage services into remote communities.
"Normally, we'd conduct 500 sessions in schools around NSW each week. But we can't deliver services face-to-face right now," Ms Emery said.
"There's certainly a lot more challenges to services in rural and remote areas where the quality of the [internet] connection struggles."
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Despite the challenges, the organisation has maintained 70 per cent of its appointments, transitioning from school to home care.
"For the past six years, 50 per cent of our services have been delivered via Telehealth," Ms Emery said.
"We've been ready for online, but there have been challenges."
The charity has also had to postpone its annual fundraising event, Ride 4 Country Kids, which would have taken place in May.
"We're hoping to host it in September and we're looking into virtual options," Ms Emery said.
"The money from that goes towards getting services into country areas so we do really rely on it."