Liana Cahill is an occupational therapist, researcher and lecturer. She holds a Masters of Public Health and has worked in Australia, the United Kingdom and South Africa. As part of her PhD, she completed a Cochrane Review on implementation strategies in stroke rehabilitation, was involved in a national, multi-site knowledge translation project (The SENSe Implement study) and used theoretical frameworks to explore implementation issues. Liana was given an award for Outstanding Oral Presentation for Research Impact at the 2019 Victorian Allied Health Research Conference.
Kate Carroll is a senior clinician physiotherapist who has spent the last 17 years working in the Neurology Department at the Royal Children’s Hospital as a researcher and clinician to children who have neuromuscular disorders. In 2009 she completed her PhD. She has initiated and participated in numerous research projects and regularly collaborates with colleagues interstate and internationally. Kate has worked on international pharmaceutical trials and natural history studies as a clinical evaluator and has co-authored a number of publications. Kate is also the lecturer in paediatric physiotherapy at Monash University, coordinating their postgraduate paediatric program.
Vin is the Allied Health Research Director at South Metropolitan Health Service (SMHS) and the Faculty of Health Sciences at Curtin University, and an Associate Professor in the Curtin School of Allied Health. His main field of research is on exercise training and promotion of physical activity for people with chronic lung diseases (e.g. lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease). Vin has published over 70 papers in peer-review journals and has received many awards for his research, including the 2018 Curtin University Early Career Researcher of the year and the 2020 Cancer Council WA’s Early Career Cancer Researcher of the Year.
Dragana Ceprnja is a Health Professional Educator and senior musculoskeletal physiotherapist at Westmead Hospital. Dragana is currently enrolled in a PhD at Western Sydney University, with the focus of her studies being pregnancy related pelvic girdle pain. Dragana has a strong commitment to improving health care experiences and outcomes in musculoskeletal conditions, and is involved in research addressing services in low back pain, knee osteoarthritis, education and health literacy. Dragana is Chair of the Physiotherapy Research Committee and is a current recipient of the Westmead Hospital Charitable Trust Allied Health Research Grant.
Dr. Kwang Cham is an optometrist and a senior lecturer at the University of Melbourne. His educational scholarship interests include using digital technologies for feedback and assessment, inter-professional education, and inter-disciplinary object-based learning engaging with material culture.
Dr. Cham has received numerous educational research grants and has presented at national and international conferences on the scholarship of teaching and learning. He is currently a fellow of the Melbourne Academy and a member of the Australian and New Zealand Association for Health Professional Educators.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”Professor Roy Cheung” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
Professor Roy Cheung received his physiotherapy undergraduate and PhD degrees in Hong Kong, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Spaulding National Running Center, Harvard Medical School. Professor Cheung specialized in human gait biomechanics and retraining research, in particular biomechanical factors of musculoskeletal conditions, neural control of gait, and development of wearable sensors for gait retraining. Roy has supervised a number of Master and PhD students with a diverse background (e.g., physical therapists, physicians, and engineers). His research work has been continuously supported by major competitive grants, and his research deliverables include US patents and international invention awards.
Marianne qualified as an orthoptist in 2008 (University of Liverpool, UK). After working in clinical practice, diagnosing/managing binocular vision and eye movement disorders in children and adults, she completed a Masters in Research and studied visual distortions in amblyopia at Glasgow Caledonian University for her PhD. She moved to the University of Surrey in June 2016 to train in interdisciplinary health services research, working with nurses, midwives, paramedics and other AHPs. Marianne is now a Clinical Vision Research Fellow, at the University of Melbourne’s Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences and the Australian College of Optometry’s National Vision Research Institute.
Dr Annette Davis has been a Podiatrist for over 25 years and completed her PhD in footwear and falls at Monash University in 2018. Annette has worked at the Department of Health Victoria in the development of allied health workforce governance documents in both health and disability. Annette is on the Monash Health Low Risk Ethics Committee and her substantive role is the allied health WISER (Workforce Innovation Strategy Education and Research) manager. She is currently working with Monash Health Community in the Acting Director of Community Strategy and Support position.
Katrina Dunn is the Director of Speech Pathology and Audiology at West Moreton Hospital and Health Service in Queensland. She is currently enrolled in a Doctor of Philosophy at The University of Queensland investigating dysphagia following non-traumatic subarachnoid haemorrhage. In addition to her PhD studies, Katrina has been involved in several research projects within Queensland Health and is passionate about improving allied health service models and access to care.
Andrea is the Manager of Dietetics and Allied Health GEM teams at Eastern Health and a PhD candidate at Monash University in the Department of Dietetics, Nutrition and Food. Andrea has extensive clinical and leadership experience in a variety of clinical settings. She has a passion for workforce re design and exploration of models of care that are responsive to client need. She project managed the delivery of the DHHS allied health workforce project that resulted in the Victorian Assistant Workforce Model. Her Doctorial thesis is focused on design research using the Design Thinking approach, to design a ‘patient centred model of nutrition care for weight loss’ for patients who co-present with overweight and obesity in the acute hospital setting.
Dr Robyn Fary is a lecturer and researcher within the School of Allied Health at Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia where she is Physiotherapy Discipline Lead and Physiotherapy Honours Coordinator. She also supervises Honours, Masters and PhD students. Dr Fary has extensive clinical, management and governance experience in the public and private health sectors, in urban and remote area locations. Dr Fary’s qualifications include a PhD, Graduate Diploma in Manipulative Therapy and Bachelor of Applied Science (Physiotherapy). Her research output includes: 28 peer-reviewed papers; one book chapter; and 36 papers presented at local, national and international conferences.
Dr Filbay is a NHMRC Emerging Leadership Fellow in the Department of Physiotherapy at the University of Melbourne and an Honorary Senior Research Associate in Orthopaedics, Rheumatology and Musculoskeletal Sciences at the University of Oxford. She has presented over 30 times at national and international conferences and won numerous scholarships, grants and awards for her research. Dr Filbay’s research expertise includes evaluating and optimising outcomes after ACL injury, developing and evaluating strategies to improve outcomes for people with knee osteoarthritis, comparing surgical and non-surgical approaches for managing musculoskeletal conditions, and evaluating the long-term musculoskeletal and psychological impacts of sports participation.
Dr Abby Foster is the Allied Health Research Advisor at Monash Health. Her role is to provide tailored research support, lead projects designed to facilitate research culture and capability, and provide strategic direction for allied health research. A speech pathologist by training, she has expertise in qualitative research methods and is committed to valuing and amplifying the voices of people with communication disability through research.
Dr Frakking is a certified practising speech pathologist with 15 years clinical experience in paediatric speech pathology / allied health across tertiary, secondary and community hospital settings. Dr Frakking is a Senior Speech Pathologist at Gold Coast University Hospital and a Metro North Hospital and Health Service Clinician Research Fellow. She has attracted >$1.2 million in competitive research funding in the areas of health services research and paediatric feeding disorders. She is passionate about building research capability and capacity for health professionals working with women, children and families.
Vidula is a Clinical and Forensic Psychologist and a Healthcare manager with considerable clinical and managerial experience. She is currently working as Director Psychology for Townsville Hospital and Health service. She is passionate about service development, innovative service delivery models (particularly allied health first contact models) and rural and remote service delivery. She is interested in various ways in which Allied Health can contribute to improving patient experience and patient outcomes. She is also deeply interested in development of effective Allied Health leadership frameworks and in leadership mentoring
Catrin is a Grade One Physiotherapist at Goulburn Valley Health in Shepparton. She is currently working in neurological rehabilitation. During her Honours undergraduate degree, she completed a systematic review entitled “Prevention and management of pelvic floor dysfunction in military women and female elite athletes” which is currently in the process of publication. Catrin has a keen interest in Women’s health and looks forward to further research opportunities in physiotherapy.
Tracy Harb is an Accredited Practising Dietitian specialising in maternal and infant/child nutrition. She has many years’ experience in clinical practice in both public and private sectors. Tracy’s academic qualifications are: B. App Sci (Human Nutrition); Grad Dip Dietetics; Master of Public Health and PhD (paediatric nutrition). Her PhD explored of the link between maternal diet and colic in breastfed infants younger than four months. Tracy currently manages the Women, Youth and Children’s Community Nutrition Service at Canberra Health Services. she has also worked in public health nutrition policy and program management for the Commonwealth.
Kristie Harper (BSc OT, PhD) is a leading expert in the allied health care of older adults presenting to an Emergency Department. She is a Research Coordinator for Curtin University and Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital, Occupational Therapy. Kristie has over 20 years’ experience and leads an extensive research program in the Occupational Therapy Department largely focused on the acute care of older adults. Her current trials have focused on supporting older adults after a fall, exploring the prevalence and outcomes of patients with frailty, delirium management and improving pressure care outcomes.
Dr Megan Hatfield is a Lecturer at Curtin University in the School of Allied Health. Megan’s research focuses on supporting children with disabilities, paediatric occupational therapy practice and spirituality in children. She developed the Better OutcOmes & Successful Transition for Autism (BOOST-A), an online program that empowers adolescents’ with autism to be successful in the transition out of high school. Megan is a registered Occupational Therapist, and Unit Coordinates the Paediatrics Units in the Undergraduate and Masters Occupational Therapy Courses. She has previously worked in the disability sector, supporting children with disabilities to participate in home, community and school environments.
Sam graduated from the University of South Australia in 1996 with a Bachelor of Social Work. Sam is currently employed by Ballarat Health Services as the Grampians Regional Allied Health Clinical Educator working with a consortium of health services across the Grampians, Victoria. Since graduating Sam has worked in rural areas across South Australia, Northern Territory and Victoria. Sam has completed post graduate studies in Community Health, Chronic Conditions and Health Literacy. Sam’s interests include Interprofessional Education, Rural Regional Student Placements, the AHA Workforce and Clinical Supervision. Sam is a passionate advocate for Rural Allied Health broadly and is a member of the Allied Health Clinical Educators Network – Victoria.
Associate Professor Shapour Jaberzadeh, PhD, Physiotherapist/Neuroscientist, Director of research, Director of Non-invasive Brain Stimulation & Neuroplasticity Laboratory (2010-current), Department of Physiotherapy, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. He is an expert in the field of non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS) where his contributions span from basic studies on healthy and proof-of-principle and clinical trials on patient participants. His research aims at understanding of the mechanisms that control brain plasticity by concentrating on combining transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) with neuroimaging techniques such as electroencephalography (EEG), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to understand the role of excitatory/inhibitory mechanisms, and plasticity in healthy and unhealthy brain function.
Natasha Jojo is an Assistant Professor, under the Faculty of Health and Nursing International student Convenor, University of Canberra. Augmenting her professional background in Mental Health Nursing she completed her doctorate in Nursing from National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bangalore, India in 2018.Her research are focused on children with Intellectual Disability and their parents, training them in sexuality and sexual abuse. She has more than ten years of teaching and research experience. She has worked in various capacities, as Editorial Board Member, as member of Ethics Committee, and Peer reviewer for several National and International journals. She has several publications in national and international journals, and she has been a resource person for national and international conferences. She is a recognized Guide for the Doctoral students in University of Canberra.
Corey is a Biomechanist and accredited Exercise Scientist and is working in the Clinical Gait Analysis Service at Monash Health in Melbourne. After completing his PhD in 2013 in Achilles tendon biomechanics, he did a post-doc at the Centre for Sports and Exercise Medicine at Queen Mary University of London looking at evidence-based care pathways for 5 common injuries requiring physiotherapy. Since returning to Australia, Corey has been an active member on a range of research committees at Monash Health and his current interests include: clinical gait, evidence informed healthcare improvement, data analytics, and implementation science.
Mary Joyce is the Head of Department of Social Work, for the Sir Charles Gairdner Osborne Park Health Care Group in Western Australia.
She holds a Masters of Business Administration and has held clinical, strategic planning and management roles in the health sector. Mary has a strong commitment to optimising the delivery of social work services, particularly to the most vulnerable, by research, advanced learning and supervision.
Mary has a keen interest in Information technology, she is the Chairperson of the “Allied Health System” used in metropolitan WA and is a representative on state and national bodies regarding allied health data collection.
Steve Lau graduated from Monash University in 2019 with a Bachelor of Physiotherapy (Honours). He is currently a physiotherapist at Northeast Health Wangaratta and a research assistant at Monash University.
Whilst completing his studies at Monash University, Steve was a recipient of the Winter Vacation Research Scholarship from Monash University, where he assisted in a scoping review titled: How is “centredness” conceptualized in peer-reviewed health literature? A scoping review. Within Steve’s work as a research assistant, he has been involved in projects within physiotherapy education for undergraduate students.
Steve’s current research interests lie primarily in physiotherapy education.
Senior Musculoskeletal Physiotherapist and Head of Department Physiotherapy, Westmead Hospital. Substantial postgraduate physiotherapy clinical practice and qualifications including MBA, Clinical Redesign and a Diploma of Leadership and Management. Expertise in strategically engaging with senior stakeholders to make critical decisions that enhance service delivery and drive an ongoing focus on quality improvement. Katherine is actively engaged in research with 9 peer-reviewed publications and over $125,000 in grant funding. She was a reviewer for the ACI Model of Care, Low Back Pain and has successfully been awarded three Western Sydney Local Health District Quality Awards and acknowledgement from both the Australian Physiotherapy Association (APA) and Agency for Clinical Innovation (ACI).
Heather Malcolm is the Chief Allied Health Advisor for NT Health. An experienced Physiotherapist, Heather has lived in Darwin since 1993 and commenced in Health in 2012. Heather has held roles in strategic policy, clinical quality and clinician engagement areas, as well as managing diverse medical portfolios including genomics, health technology and cancer care, before moving to the Allied Health leadership role in 2019. In 2020, Heather also became the Functional Lead for the implementation of the NT Health Virtual Care Strategy. She undertakes national accreditation work for the Australian Physiotherapy Council and is a panel member for Ahpra.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”A/Prof. Peter Malliaras” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
Peter Malliaras is a physiotherapist and researcher from Melbourne, Australia specializing in tendinopathy. In 2006 he completed his PhD in tendinopathy identifying novel risk factors, and since has undertaken post doctoral research in the UK and Australia, and has co-authored over 120 peer review publications. Currently, he is an Associate Professor at Monash University Physiotherapy Department and involved in multiple funded tendinopathy research projects in Australia and internationally. His research focuses on understanding pain and neuromuscular impairments, and clinical trials testing the efficacy of exercise and other interventions in tendinopathy. Peter maintains a strong clinical focus, specializing in difficult tendinopathy cases and regularly consults to elite athletes.
Jeanne is a speech pathologist with clinical expertise in paediatric feeding disorders and dysphagia. She is currently employed in a conjoint research fellow role between Children’s Health Queensland and The University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia. Jeanne’s research interests include paediatric feeding disorders and dysphagia, telepractice, education, and simulation. Jeanne also has a passion for research translation and building research capacity in the allied health workforce.
Dr Priya Martin is a health services researcher and health professions educator with an interest in improving the safety and quality of healthcare, and translating research to practice. Following completion of her multi-award winning PhD, she is currently undertaking a post-doctoral Advance Queensland Industry Research Fellowship on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on clinical supervision of health professionals. She also holds an adjunct Research Fellow appointment at the University of Queensland Rural Clinical School. Her areas of research expertise include workforce education and training, clinical supervision, interprofessional education and collaborative practice, mixed methods designs, program evaluation and rural health.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”Dr Danilo de Oliveira Silva” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
Dr Danilo De Oliveira Silva is a physiotherapist, current Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at La Trobe Sport and Exercise Medicine (LASEM) Research Centre, Melbourne, Australia. His research is focused on understanding the integration among biomechanics, pain characteristics and psychological aspects associated with patellofemoral pain and osteoarthritis. Danilo has published more 50 peer-reviewed articles in his field, and is also passionate about translating scientific knowledge to clinical practice and has designed multiple multimedia resources to facilitate research translation to patients with musculoskeletal pain and health professionals. He is the Development Director of the Translating Research Evidence and Knowledge (TREK) initiative.
Dr Casey Peiris is a senior academic lecturer at La Trobe University and qualified physiotherapist who completed her PhD on inpatient rehabilitation delivery in 2013. Dr Peiris is a productive researcher in the fields of physiotherapy, physical activity, chronic disease and rehabilitation. Her research on weekend rehabilitation is internationally recognised and is cited in rehabilitation best practice guidelines. She has expertise in lifestyle intervention programs for chronic disease and using activity monitors to measure physical activity.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”Dr Luke Perraton” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
Dr Luke Perraton (@LukePerraton) is an APA titled Musculoskeletal and Sports and Exercise physiotherapist and physiotherapy educator/early career researcher in the Department of Physiotherapy at Monash University. He has nineteen years’ experience in physiotherapy clinical practice, education and research in the areas of orthopaedics, musculoskeletal and sports physiotherapy. He is the co-director of the Monash Musculoskeletal Research Unit (@MonashMRU), a member of the Monash University Paramedic Health and Wellbeing Research Unit (@MonashPHAWRU) and co-founder of Perraton.Physio. Luke supervises five higher-degree research students and has >40 peer-reviewed publications (>1000 citations, H-index 15) and $132,679 in internal and external research funding.
Debbie is a speech-language pathologist who qualified at the University of Sydney and has extensive experience in clinical research. She has worked on a range of projects on disordered swallowing and voice in various clinical populations and across different settings. Debbie completed her PhD at the University of Hong Kong, focusing on swallowing disorders in aged care facilities. Debbie is currently a research fellow in the School of Primary and Allied Health Care at Monash University, where she oversees projects examining public healthcare practices.
Rachel Quigley is a physiotherapist working in gerontology. She holds a clinical role in Cairns Hospital, as the Older Persons Liaison Advanced Clinician. She is also a senior Research Fellow at James Cook University. This research role focuses on projects involved with dementia and ageing targeted in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations in Far North Queensland. She has completed an MPhil through Griffith University focusing on the experiences of carers of older adults as they navigate aged care and health care systems and is undertaking a PhD developing a framework of healthy ageing for the Torres Strait.
Jenny works at Southern DHB in Dunedin, NZ as Director of Allied Health. She has been working in the healthcare setting between Scotland, England and New Zealand for the past 16 years and has a background as a Dietitian. She has experience of lecturing to nutrition students in Birmingham University, UK and discovering a gap in the market, has most recently self-published a children’s book about healthy eating. She has just completed a clinical research study looking at the benefits of telehealth for HIV patients.
Rachel Resuggan is a renowned leader in Allied Health with extensive expertise in governance within the field. Working for St John of God Health Care as the National Manager Allied Health, she is building strong foundations to provide Allied Health professionals with optimum environments in which to enable deliver excellent care. Her passion for Allied Health governance comes from years of leading Allied Health services, including the North Metropolitan Area Health Service in Western Australia. Rachel is the inaugural Chairperson for the Catholic Health Australia Allied Health committee.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”Dr Sarah Russell” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
Dr Sarah Russell is a clinical neuropsychologist working in the public system and in private practice. She completed a Masters and PhD in Clinical Neuropsychology at the University of Western Australia.
She is also an associate professor with the Healthy Ageing Research Team at James Cook University in Cairns. Her research focuses on healthy ageing, with a particular focus on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in FNQ.
Dr Mitchell Sarkies is a post-doctoral research fellow at the Centre for Healthcare Resilience and Implementation Science within the Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Macquarie University. He holds a Bachelor of Applied Science (Physiotherapy) from the University of Sydney and a PhD from Monash University focusing on health services research, implementation science, and health economics. His current work is exploring approaches to harness implementation science and complexity science to scale-up value-based healthcare initiatives for people with chronic conditions. Dr Sarkies has developed and applied several novel study designs to health services research, including a helix counterbalanced trial for the simultaneous evaluation of multiple research implementation strategies across different contexts.
Jemma is a senior lecturer and Lead of Clinical Programs in the Master of Speech Pathology, and a Senior Academic Advisor in the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences at the University of Melbourne. She has over 15 years of clinical and research experience focusing on evidence-based practice, outcome measurement, population health (particularly service access and use) in speech pathology and more broadly in rehabilitation. Her current research and teaching interests include collaborative (interdisciplinary) practice, evidence-based practice and clinical learning.
David is an early career researcher who currently works as a Research Fellow at Monash University and Peninsula Health. He completed his PhD at La Trobe University in 2018, and was awarded the Nancy Millis Award for Outstanding Thesis. His research has focussed on workforce development and implementation of healthcare initiatives within the public health network. This has included evaluating the effect of clinical supervision of allied health professionals on patient care, and advancing allied health assistants’ scope of practice in the acute hospital setting.
Dr Rosalyn Stanton is a Physiotherapist working in clinical, education, research, and leadership roles within Canberra Health Services. Her area of expertise is specialised rehabilitation including aged care, with a Master of Health Science (Neurological Rehabilitation), and a PhD on feedback in learning following stroke. Dr Stanton is the current chair of the ACT Allied Health Research Network, and the ACT member of the national network. She is the current Physiotherapy Profession Lead for the service. Her research interests include rehabilitation recovery and services, environmental design and the patient and staff experience, and student and staff education.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”Dr Kelly Weir” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
Dr Kelly Weir is a Conjoint Principal Research Fellow (Griffith University & Gold Coast Health) & Allied Health Research Team Leader at Gold Coast Health, Queensland Australia. She is a certified practicing speech pathologist with over 30 years clinical experience, predominantly in tertiary state-wide paediatric & adult hospitals. Kelly researches in the area of paediatric & adult dysphagia, management of medically fragile neonates, infants and children in critical and acute care; allied health primary contact models of care; and building research capacity in allied health professionals in healthcare settings. She champions consumer engagement as coproducers in health research.
Associate Professor Cylie Williams is a health services researcher and podiatrist at Monash University and Peninsula Health. She is a podiatrist with extensive paediatric clinical experience, and worked as a clinician in public hospitals, community health and private practice settings. She is also a certified Health Informatician (Australasia). Cylie has over 100 peer reviewed publications and has NHMRC and MRFF grant success. Her ongoing research is focused on collaborative care, communication, use of data to guide care, and developing a better understanding of the impact of strength and gait aids on mobility and foot problems in children.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”A/Prof. Anna Wong Shee” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
A/Prof Anna Wong Shee (PhD, Master Health Economics) holds a co-funded position with Ballarat Health Services and Deakin University. Anna is a registered Physiotherapist with >20 years of experience in Australia and the USA. She has expertise in stakeholder engagement and collaborating with rural and regional health services. Anna sits on the Victorian Department of Health Allied Health Research Advisory Group. Her research interests include health professional research capacity and capability building, health service models of care, and health economic evaluation.
[ultimate_heading main_heading=”Dr Abel Zhou” alignment=”left”][/ultimate_heading]
Dr. Abel Zhou is a radiographer, lecturer and researcher. Abel had more than 8 years’ experience in medical x-ray imaging and is teaching medical imaging students at University of Canberra. Abel’s research has a strong focus on radiation reduction and image quality improvement. He is an expert in Monte Carlo (MC) simulation of x-ray imaging and is an experienced user of MC methods for x-ray imaging device design, evaluation and optimization. Abel is also focusing on the application of artificial intelligence (AI) and working on AI algorithms for ultra-low dose x-ray imaging.
Dr Maryam Zoghi is an academic physiotherapist and neuroscientist with a long-standing interest in brain function particularly aspects relevant to brain excitability, motor control, sensory-motor integration and neuroplasticity. Currently she is working at Discipline of Physiotherapy, Department of Rehabilitation, Nutrition and Sport, School of Allied Health, La Trobe University. She completed her PhD in Neuroscience at the Discipline of Physiology, The University of Adelaide. Since then she has been involved in numerous research projects in this area in collaborations with national and international researchers. She has 92 peer reviewed publications including 8 book chapters in high ranked journals.
