Learning and connection

A message from the Executive Dean of Health Sciences Professor Suzanne Chambers.

The Faculty of Health Sciences research space has seen colleagues come together in a spirit of shared learning and connection in the past couple of months.

In September, Professor David Opar and Dr Ashleigh Homer organised and hosted the inaugural FHS Research Showcase and Welcome to Faculty for the Mary MacKillop Institute for Health Research in Melbourne.  The Melbourne event was exceptionally well attended. Subsequently, the Office of the Associate Dean (Research) organised and hosted showcases in North Sydney and Brisbane, which built on the success of the Melbourne event by providing opportunities to strengthen our academic community and celebrate the rich collection of skills and experiences held by our staff. In an era where many of our professional interactions are via digital platforms, these showcases were a wonderful opportunity for staff and research students to come together in person to celebrate our collective successes and explore ways to leverage our complementary skills for future opportunities and successes. Early feedback indicates that participants thoroughly enjoyed and appreciated the experience of sharing their own research and learning of the breadth of research expertise and interests in the faculty. 

Our excellent results in the Global Rankings for Nursing were recently released, with ACU now ranking fourth in Australia and 14^th in the World in Nursing by Subject area, demonstrating continuous improvement since 2019.  The Shanghai Rankings use a range of objective academic indicators and third-party data to measure the performance of world universities in relevant subjects. The ACU score related to research influence, international collaboration(s) and research quality were particularly impressive and reflects the calibre of our research.  Click here for more information. Strategies put in place by the nursing leadership over the last three years have included the development of a school research plan, the creation and fostering of a research culture within the school, school research seeding grants for projects which must have a dissemination outcome and support of staff to undertake a PhD or to participate in a research project.  I want to especially acknowledge Professors Elisabeth Jacob, Sara Bayes, Kim Foster and Associate Professors Lisa Kuhn and Louisa Lam and our Research Development Officer Alycia Jacob for the excellent work they have done in leading the school’s research program.

Directly contributing to our ranking success is the work of our Nursing Research Institute, led by Professor Sandy Middleton with the support of Professor Liz McInnes. This team was recently placed third at the prestigious Triple E Awards in Kuala Lumpur for their outstanding work on the Quality in Acute Stroke Care (QASC) Project. This recognition highlights the team's commitment to enhancing patient care and outcomes in acute stroke management.

In another win for collaboration and shared learning, the Wonnarua Nation Aboriginal Corporation (WNAC), in partnership with ACU and RMIT, have won a $897,791.32 grant from the National Road Safety Action Grants Program, funded by the Australian Government Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Artsfor a project titled: Deadly Safe Driving: The First of Its Kind  - A Virtual Reality Rural Driving Hazard Perception Training Program for Young First Nations Drivers.  ACU’s Dr Joanne Bennett from the School of Behavioural and Health Sciences is joined by Mr Laurie Perry (CEO, WNAC), and Associate Professor Jonathan Duckworth (RMIT) as Lead Chief Investigators on the project.  The project is also supported by ACU’s Professor Rhonda Craven, Professor Herb Marsh, Professor David Greene, Dr Thomas McGuckian, Dr Chloe Gordon, and Dr Li Ping Thong (RMIT).  Gordon Driving School and Key Driving School will provide first-hand technical and educational support and interventions to Indigenous Drivers on Wonnarua Country. RMIT will deliver contextualised simulated hazard perception training programs from their established digital design team.  A project that can only happen with teamwork and inclusion.

I also wish to congratulate Professor John Gleeson who has been allocated $20,000 seed funding from the ACMD Challenge steering committee, which is supported by The Victorian Government - Australian Medtech Manufacturing Centre (AMMC) and SCV (Safer Care Victoria). The funds will support a Youth Mental Health Pilot project.

Recently released and updated in August is Stanford/Elsevier’s World’s top 2% of scientist rankings. This publicly available database of top-cited scientists provides standardized information on citations, h-index, co-authorship adjusted hm-index, citations to papers in different authorship positions and a composite indicator (c-score). I extend my congratulations to Dr Anthony Barnett, Professor Louise Burke, Professor Cerin Ester, Professor John Hawley and Professor Jim Sallis from the Mary McKillop Institute for Health Research;  Professor Maree Johnson, Professor Liz McInnes and Professor Sandy Middleton from the Nursing Research Institute; Professor Kim Foster and Professor Paul Fulbrook, mental health and nursing disciplines;  Associate Professor Grant Duthie,  Professor Shona Halson, Professor David Opar and Dr Jonathon Weakley from exercise science, Dr John Oldroyd in public health, Dr Phillip Parker in science, Professor David Penn and Professor Peter Wilson in psychology, and myself with a foot in each camp of nursing and psychology. My congratulations to all on the list and my appreciation for your contribution to our research excellence.

And moving to the next generation of researchers, James Czencz, PhD candidate in the School of Allied Health recently attended the European Network for the Promotion of Health-Enhancing Physical Activity Conference to present work from his PhD on the wants and needs of adults with cerebral palsy who use wheelchairs in relation to physical activity. He also presented his experiences creating an inclusive beach day in Port Campbell and a mixed-methods study to assess participants' experiences from the day. James was later invited to return to discuss his beach inclusion work at the CP-Life webinar hosted by the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin. The CP-Life presentation sparked a potential collaboration with a UK-based team offering therapy services and student placements in Mexico. Together, they are exploring initiatives to implement beach inclusion and student-mentored gym experiences in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. James’ work highlights the importance of translating our research into something impactful to the communities we seek to serve.

Congratulations also to the Faculty’s PhD students on their success in the ACU 3MT Competition. Chanchal Kurup was the People’s Choice; Katie Headrick the runner-up and Dhatsayini Rattambige the ACU 3MT Finalist.  A wonderful achievement.