6th Australian Palliative Care Research Colloquium

Due to unforeseen circumstances, the 6th Australian Palliative Care Research Colloquium will not be taking place this year.

We apologise for any inconvenience caused. If you have any queries please email us at centre.palliativecare@svha.org.au or phone 94160000.

Presenters & Facilitators

Professor Jennifer Philip

Jennifer Philip is the appointed Chair of Palliative Medicine, University of Melbourne, St Vincent’s Hospital and the Victorian Comprehensive Cancer Centre. Jennifer is a palliative care clinician, researcher and teacher whose particular areas of interest include improving the ways supportive and palliative care are delivered, ensuring care is underpinned by high quality evidence and that it is delivered by well trained professionals and carers. She heads the VCCC Palliative Medicine Research Group.

Professor Jennifer Martin

Professor Jennifer Martin is a leading Clinical Pharmacologist. She is the Chair of the discipline of Clinical Pharmacology in the School of Medicine and Public Health at the University of Newcastle and a senior staff specialist in internal medicine at the John Hunter Hospital. Professor Martin is also Director of the NHMRC-funded Australia Centre for Cannabinoid Clinical and Research Excellence (ACRE), Australia's first federally-funded research centre in medicinal cannabinoids to ensure quality and safety in the implementation of medicinal cannabis use in the community.

Professor Martin is the lead chief investigator on a $1.96 million Cancer Council NSW pathways grant to develop a personalised chemotherapy dosing system for cancer patients, and has received more than $3m in funding for medicinal cannabis research as part of NSW Health's Clinical Cannabis Medicines Program. In addition, Professor Martin is part of Australia's first medical cannabis trial to produce world-class pharmacokinetic analysis and sophisticated modelling to inform drug dosage and frequency of administration.

Based at the Hunter Medical Research Institute, the former Rhodes Scholar leads a team of pharmacy and medicine experts together with pharmacoepidemiologists and pharmacoeconomists.

Dr Grace Walpole

Grace is a new palliative medicine specialist currently undertaking a research fellowship position at Monash Health around the implementation of medicinal cannabis prescribing in a tertiary hospital setting for oncology and palliative care patients.

Professor Peter Hudson

Peter is the Director of the Centre for Palliative Care which is a state-wide academic unit based at St Vincent’s Hospital, and a Collaborative Centre of the University of Melbourne, Australia. He is a Professor (Honorary) at the University of Melbourne, and Professor (Honorary) at Vrije University Brussels, Belgium. Peter is a registered nurse with more than twenty-five years’ experience in palliative care practice, education and research. He was Vice President of Palliative Care Australia and a Director of the Board of the International Association for Hospice and Palliative Care. Peter is the Chair of the European Association for Palliative Care’s International Palliative Care Family Caregiver Research Collaboration, and he is an international expert advisor to the All Ireland Institute of Hospice and Palliative Care. He has authored numerous international journal publications and has attracted over 10 million dollars in research grant income. Peter is a past recipient of the Premier’s Award for translating evidence into practice, and has recently been appointed as a USA Fulbright scholar.

Professor Glenn Bowes

Glenn Bowes is a Professor of Paediatrics and currently Associate Dean (Advancement) in the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences at the University of Melbourne, where for the past 10 years he has led the advancement and philanthropic engagement activities of the Faculty. He completed his medical degree and PhD at Monash University and postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Toronto. As Director of Respiratory Medicine at the Alfred Hospital in the 1980s he led the establishment of Australia’s first Adult Cystic Fibrosis program. He moved to the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) Melbourne in 1991 to become the founding Director of the Centre for Adolescent Health. Over the following 17 years he held many leadership positions at RCH including Executive Director, Chief Medical Officer and the Stevenson Chair of Paediatrics. He has served as a Board member of many organisations including Anglicare Victoria, Mentone Grammar and the Royal Children’s Hospital Foundation. He has been Board Chair of Northern Health, Very Special Kids, Lord Somers Camp & Power House and the Youth Substance Abuse Service. He was appointed an Officer in the Order of Australia (AO) in 2016.

Professor Jane Phillips

Professor Phillips is the Director of IMPACCT - Improving Palliative, Aged and Chronic Care through Clinical Research and Translation, and Professor of Palliative Nursing at University of Technology Sydney. Jane has an established program of research focused on improving care outcomes for people in the last year of life by strengthening the nexus between research, policy and practice. She is currently undertaking: studies to evaluate non-pharmacological interventions to improve breathlessness and delirium; health services research to improve care outcomes for older people with cancer and to improve symptom management for older people in residential aged care; and translational research in the areas of pain management and symptom management. She has developed and evaluated nurse coordinated models of palliative care and has extensive experience in cancer and chronic disease nursing, and research. She is the current President of Palliative Care Nurses Australia, and immediate past Chair of the National Palliative Care Clinical Studies Collaborative Trials Management Group and on the Executive Committee of the NSW collaborative palliative care trials group IMPACCT (Improving Palliative Care through Clinical Trials). She is also the Chair of the Clinical Oncology Society Australia (COSA) Palliative Care Interest Group, and is a member of the COSA Geriatric Oncology Interest Group.

Dr Chi Li

Dr Chi Li is a Palliative Care Physician in Victoria. His areas of interest include advanced lung and heart diseases and transplantation, rural health, psycho-oncology and clinical supervision, consumer partnership and leadership, publishing and social media. Chi is the editor of the Australian and New Zealand Society of Palliative Medicine (ANZSPM) Newsletter, a founding member of Palliverse.com and can be found on Twitter @Dr_Chi_Li @ANZSPMed @Palliverse.

Professor Lindy Willmott

Lindy Willmott is a Professor at the Law Faculty at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and a member of the Australian Centre for Health Law Research. She has degrees in commerce and law from the University of Queensland, a Masters of Law degree from Cambridge University, and a PhD in law from QUT. Lindy researches and publishes extensively in the health law field, particularly at the end of life. She has co-authored more than 10 texts in health law and contracts law and is a co-author of the website ‘End of Life Law in Australia’. Lindy is currently undertaking a number of empirical research projects funded by the Australian Research Council and the National Health and Medical Research Council. She also co-leads a project, funded by the Commonwealth Department of Health, to provide legal training to medical specialists about the law at the end of law.

Lindy is a Board Member of Palliative Care Australia, an Associate Editor of the Journal of Medical Ethics, and is on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Law and Medicine. She has been a Commissioner with the Queensland Law Reform Commission and a part-time member of the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal.

Mr James Cameron

James is currently undertaking a PhD at the Law School at the University of Melbourne. The research is focused on decisions to withdraw or withhold life sustaining treatment from children. James has also worked as a Senior Policy Officer at the Department of Health and Human Services on the development of new legislation.

Dr Jennifer Weil

Jenny is a Palliative Care Physician, medical educator and clinician researcher. How these roles intersect, interrelate and translate to the bedside and impact on patient care is source of constant inspiration. Jenny has broad input into the activities of the Centre with particular oversight of research activities. Her role as the Lead of the CPC Clinical Trials Group exemplifies the combination of developing a clinically relevant research agenda with efficient translation into practice – effectively “closing the loop”. Her other research and education interests include clinical communication skills training, non-malignant palliative care, palliative care needs of acute hospital junior medical staff and the experience of patients with advanced illness presenting to the emergency department.

A/Prof Brian Le

Brian is the Director of Palliative Care at the Victorian Comprehensive Cancer Centre, including the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and The Royal Melbourne Hospital. Brian is a specialist in both Palliative Medicine and Medical Oncology, and is an Associate Professor of the University of Melbourne.

Dr Tina Thomas

Dr Tina Thomas has worked at the Centre for Palliative Care for over a decade and has been involved in a number of research studies on improving the support for family carers in the palliative care context and has published widely in this area. She has coordinated National studies examining group and individual interventions designed to support family carers who are caring for someone with an advanced disease. Most recently she has completed a multisite clinical trial on the effectiveness of family meetings in palliative care. She has also been involved in studies on prolonged grief, and on the experience of parents of children with a life limiting illness. Her background is as a qualified psychologist and she has a Doctorate in Health Psychology. She also facilitates communication skills training workshops for health professionals as part of the Specialist Certificate in Palliative Care. She is currently leading a National project to develop an evidence-based online resource for partners, relatives of friends who are caring for someone with an advanced disease.

A/Prof Clare O'Callaghan

Clare O'Callaghan PhD is a Research Associate with the Department of Palliative and Supportive Care, Cabrini Health, and Institute for Ethics and Society, The University of Notre Dame. Clare leads and collaborates in grant supported studies with foci including spiritual and bioethical dimensions of end-of-life care. The aim is to develop translatable findings which enable people affected by advanced illnesses to live comfortably, meaningfully, and with dignity. Clare was also the first music therapist employed in palliative care in Australia in 1985 and continues to practice at Caritas Christi Hospice, St Vincent's Hospital Melbourne. At St Vincent's Clare also works with the Psychosocial Cancer Care Research Program. Throughout an extensive clinician-researcher career, Clare developed expertise in qualitative and mixed methods research and is regularly invited to collaborate on cancer and palliative care studies, including advance care planning, service evaluation, information needs in minority communities, and parent-child cancer communication. As NHMRC Post-Doctoral Fellow (2008-9), Clare examined music's role when affected by cancer, and in the care of Sichuan earthquake survivors. Academic contributions comprise 90 refereed journal articles and book chapters. Honorary titles include Associate Professor, Department of Medicine, St Vincent's Hospital, The University of Melbourne.

Professor Penny Schofield

A behavioural scientist by training, Penny Schofield was appointment as Professor of Health Psychology at Swinburne University in March 2015 after 15 years leading a research team at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre. She was reappointed at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre as the Head of Behavioural Science in 2017.

Her research program adopts a comprehensive approach to develop and deliver effective and sustainable interventions that promote self-care, improve emotional and physical outcomes for patients with cancer and other chronic illnesses, and alleviate burden on the health system. Digital Health is the current focus of her research. All of her current work addresses the issue of how to intelligently layer innovative mobile technological solutions to chronic health issues with targeted clinician input to achieve optimal health outcomes in a cost-effective manner.

Prof Schofield has been Chief Investigator for 39 peer-reviewed grants totalling approximately $16,000,000 and has ~150 peer reviewed publications.

Dr Michael Chapman

Michael is a geriatrician, and palliative medicine specialist who is the Director of Palliative Care at Canberra Hospital, and chair of the ACT Palliative Care Network. He has an appointment at ANU and academic interests in the experience of dementia, palliative care in aged care, communication skills, and student welfare. He is a founding member of the online community Palliverse (www.palliverse.com) which seeks to bring broaden the conversation about palliative care in our region.

Ms Soula Ganiatsas

Soula is the Head of Operations of Centre for Palliative Care and the Program Manager of Palliative Care Research Network (PCRN). She brings her extensive experience as a former CEO of the Victorian Prostate Cancer Research Consortium (VPCRC), a not-for-profit consortium aimed at improving and integrating prostate cancer research across Victoria. Prior to this, Soula held senior roles in the hospital, academic and industry sectors, including Executive Officer of the Australian Prostate Cancer Research Centre at Epworth Hospital and Business Manager for Peter McCallum Cancer Centre's Research Division. Soula also has a Master in Business Administration (MBA) and 12 years of laboratory-based scientific cancer research experience at world-leading biomedical research institutions.

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