Our Social Purpose

 Complex challenges, such as inequality in access to cancer supportive services, can be tough to solve. Identification, understanding, and accessibility of allied health services for people living with or beyond cancer is challenging for all, including marginalised communities and those living rurally. 

The long-term impact of cancer and its treatments, and the unmet needs of people living with or beyond cancer are well documented. Impacts and unmet needs such as living with chronic cancer-related fatigue, difficulties with cognition, returning to or maintaining employment, poor health literacy, knowing how to seek advice and get tailored help and social isolation, all contribute to the psychosocial burden associated with living with or beyond cancer. Additionally, these impacts contribute to long-term poor health and economic outcomes. 

The current healthcare system in Australia can be difficult to access for people living in rural and remote areas. It can even more difficult when trying to access specialist health professional services such as oncology experts.  

These regions suffer from a deficit of allied health services such as occupational therapy, which enable people to participate in their daily lives and to reclaim and rebuild their life after cancer. Even though rural and remote people constitute 30% of the Australian population, and the number of occupational therapists in Australia grew by 31.1% over the five years between 2015/16 to 2019/20, most growth occurred in metropolitan areas.  Long travelling distances, extensive wait times and workforce shortages resulted in difficulties accessing therapy and high levels of unmet need.  

At Selsus, our core purpose is to ease these outcomes by providing quality care and support at the right time for those with a cancer diagnosis.  

While other areas of the health care sector, the government and non-profit sectors play a key role in addressing this issue, social enterprises can value add. We work from a collaborative model of care – working with people with cancer, their families, their support systems and through partnerships within communities at all levels.  

Selsus is a social enterprise that seeks to make occupational therapy services more accessible for marginalised communities, and for people with all cancer types. We provide allied health services to those who have trouble accessing it, particularly those living in rural and remote Australia. Selsus aims to identify people who are missed by the system or are waiting too long for services and provide them with support delivered by cancer experts.  

As a social enterprise, Selsus aims to deliver services for these individuals and their families and is committed to reinvesting 50% of profits into achieving our social purpose. That commitment is at the core of everything we do, and transparency on how we achieve it is vital through our social impact reporting. 

 We use the 'theory of change' framework to measure our social impact. The "theory of change" is a framework commonly used in the field of social impact measurement to articulate and visualise the causal pathway through which an organisation or intervention aims to bring about a positive social change. It provides a comprehensive and logical explanation of how activities and inputs are expected to lead to specific short-term, intermediate, and long-term outcomes, ultimately contributing to the desired impact. 

Selsus operates on the theory of change that a systematic and evidence-based approach to cancer rehabilitation can facilitate a return to active life for individuals after-cancer. By offering comprehensive rehabilitation services, including physical therapy, counselling, and community integration, Selsus aims to achieve short-term outcomes such as improved physical functioning, heightened awareness of support services, and effective symptom management. Over the long term, Selsus anticipates sustained functional independence, an enhanced quality of life, reduced healthcare expenditure, cost saving via quicker return-to-work and a reduced risk of recurrence.  One of our primary focus areas is to increase access to regional and rural communities. Through a commitment to fostering healthier habits and facilitating social connections, Selsus seeks to enable individuals to reintegrate into daily life successfully and contribute to their communities. Selsus envisions a future where a structured and evidence-informed rehabilitation approach can lead to tangible and lasting improvements in the lives of those navigating post-cancer recovery.