Congratulations Associate Prof Shariful Islam
Share your congratulations with our very own CRE member, Associate Professor Shariful for receiving a Tall Poppy Award. The Tall Poppy Campaign recognises the achievements of Australian scientists through the prestigious annual Young Tall Poppy Science Awards. The Campaign then engages the winners of Young Tall Poppy Science Awards (‘Tall Poppies’) in activities to promote interest in science among school students and teachers, as well as an understanding and appreciation of science in the broader community.
Grant Success and Other Updates
Associate Professor Jo-anne Manski-Nankervis, along with colleagues from Monash and Melbourne University, and including two other CRE members – Professor Dougie Boyle and Dr Rita McMorrow – were successful with a NHMRC Partnership Grant, MenoPROMPT which a co-designed, comprehensive, evidence-based program to improve the care of women at and after menopause.
Future Health Today (FHT)
The team are also involved with the Future Health Today (FHT) program which has marked the completion of their 12-month randomised control trial at the end of September, following the participation of 40 general practices in the program’s quality improvement activities. The FHT program, consisting of a software tool with a dashboard and an active clinical decision support tool, plus quality improvement activities and cased based learning series, was trialled during the height of the COVID-19 lockdown period. Results are pending for the trial which aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of the program with a focus on two important clinical issues: reduction of cardiovascular risk in people with chronic kidney disease and appropriate follow up for people with pathology test results associated with risk of undiagnosed cancer. FHT is a collaborative project between The University of Melbourne and Western Health and is led by Associate Professor Jo-Anne Manski-Nankervis in the University’s Department of General Practice with Professor Dougie Boyle, also from the University, leading the technical development. The team expresses their gratitude to the practice staff who participated in the trial during an incredibly challenging time and looks forward to publishing
Three of our Career Development Program members, Chris Lynch, George Zisis, and Justin Braver have had abstracts accepted for the upcoming NHMRC Research Translation Long Weekend. Brian Oldenburg and Chris Lynch have also had an abstract accepted for the upcoming European Cardiology Society – Asia Conference in Singapore, “Implementation evaluation of mHealth interventions in the secondary prevention of coronary artery disease: A review”.
MRFF Targeted Translation Research Accelerator Grant (TTRA)
Led by Professor Oldenburg and with funding from the Australian Government’s Targeted Translation Research Accelerator (TTRA) program, the team – which also involves one of our Career Development Program trainees, Chris Lynch – will develop a digitally enabled HF management program to improve heart failure outcomes in the community. Collaborating partners include our industry partner, Cardihab, the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, Northern Health, Violet Vines Marshman Centre for Rural Health Research/La Trobe University, Western Health and Tasmanian Health service.
Dr Jonathan Rawstorn is a co-investigator on a recently announced Heart Foundation Vanguard Grant led by IPAN’s Dr Katherine Livingstone. The 1-year project, titled “Veg4Me – A personalized digital health solution for improving vegetable intake and heart health in young adults living in rural communities”, has received funding to assess the feasibility of a personalized digital intervention to support increased vegetable consumption among young adults living in rural areas. It is the only Vanguard Grant awarded in this round to a project in the “Public Health” category.
Dr George Siopis has been invited to give a presentation at the upcoming International Society of Hypertension Conference on “Comparative effectiveness, reach, uptake, and feasibility of digital health interventions for people with hypertension: A systematic review and meta-analysis “. It has been shortlisted as one of top five abstracts for new investigators. George will be presenting alongside the conference opening ceremony that will feature the Crown Prince of Japan, Nobel Laureate Prof Shinya Yamanaka (iPS), and the second Japanese female Astronaut, Ms Naoko Yamazaki.
Charlene Wright Mathews is one of our CDP members who recently presented at the “European Health Psychology Society Conference” in Bratislava (Slovakia) on “A digital health program in bariatric surgery: A mixed method process evaluation”. She also participated in the “Collaborative Research and Training in the EHPS (CREATE) Early Career Researcher pre-conference workshop” in Bratislava “Digitalizing Health Psychology research to enhance our science: opening the doors to innovative measurement, design, and intervention approaches”.
Sarah Tighe secured a postdoctoral research position on the SEURO EU Horizons Project: https://seuro2020.eu/. She will also be presenting at the 15th Irish Irish Human Computer Interaction (iHCI) Symposium hosted at Ulster University Belfast, on 18th November 2022. Please find Sarah’s latest publication BMJ Open and it will be available to all in the coming weeks Tighe SA, Ball K, Kayser L, Kensing F, Maddison R. Qualitative study of the views of people living with cardiovascular disease, and healthcare professionals, towards the use of a digital platform to support cardiovascular disease self-management. BMJ Open 2022;0:e056768. doi:10.1136/ bmjopen-2021-056768.
Our CDP member, George Zisis has published a recent paper in the top-ranked Journal of the American College of Cardiology (Journal Impact Factor 27): -https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jacc.2022.04.064. George will also be presenting his work in November at University of Melbourne Research Conference.