Professor Manuela Ferreira
Professor Ferreira is NHMRC Investigator Fellow, Professor of Musculoskeletal Health and Program Head, Musculoskeletal Health, at The George Institute for Global Health, where she conducts research on the mechanisms, prognosis and management of musculoskeletal disorders with a focus on low back pain. Before joining The George Institute, she was Professor of Musculoskeletal Health at the University of Sydney, where she was inaugural chair of the Musculoskeletal Priority Research Area (+80 researchers) at the Kolling Institute, and co-chair of the Musculoskeletal Clinical Advisory Group of Sydney Health Partners (an NHMRC, Sydney University and health district research translation partnership). With +320 scientific publications, and +AUD30M in research funding, she is the 2nd highest ranked researcher in the world for ‘low back pain’ (of a total of 33,000 authors worldwide – Expertscape). She currently leads multiple randomised controlled trials of musculoskeletal interventions, including the first placebo randomised controlled trial of spinal surgery, an NHMRC-funded study that will establish the efficacy of decompressive surgery for lumbar spinal stenosis.
From chronic back pain to arthritis – how can we transform patient care and why is early collaboration with clinicians essential?
Back pain treatment: How do we decide when – or if – to intervene?
Dr Kate Hunter
Dr Kate Hunter, PhD, MPH is a senior research fellow with Guunu-maana (Heal), Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health program at The George Institute and conjoint senior lecturer at the University of NSW. She is elected chair of Kidsafe NSW (2018-current) and an elected Executive member of the Australasian Injury Prevention Network (2019-current). Working at the knowledge interface – bringing together Indigenous and western knowledges - Dr Hunter’s expertise is in applying an equity lens across the injury prevention spectrum through the conduct and evaluation of complex community and hospital-based programs, ensuring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voices are central to her work.
Dr Hunter prioritises translational research. She has a track record in scale-up of successful programs, with her research being cited in policy and national guidelines. Dr Hunter is committed to supporting the next generation of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander and non-Aboriginal researchers working in partnership with Aboriginal communities and organisations. She has supervised four Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander PhD candidates to completion.
What are we doing to ensure sex and gender is included in health research?
How much do you know about clinical trials?
Cardiovascular disease in women and men - what's the difference?
A/Prof Shweta Gidwani
Assistant Professor Shweta Gidwani (MBBS, MRCEM, FRCEM) is a practicing emergency medicine physician at Chelsea & Westminster NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK where she holds a substantive appointment since 2013, serving as the global emergency medicine and quality improvement lead there. For the last 10 yrs she has also held an adjunct Assistant Professor faculty position at Ronald Reagan Institute of Emergency Medicine at The George Washington University, USA and a core member of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine Global Emergency Medicine committee.
Her work focuses on emergency care capacity building through innovative training models with a view to build provider capacity at scale and build health system and workforce resilience, particularly in LMICs, She has over a decade of experience on the field through partnership projects in a number of countries including India, Uganda and Ghana.
Her main interests include emergency medicine curriculum development, medical education, trauma care, wellbeing, HIV testing in non-traditional settings, patient safety, quality improvement and digital health. She is an advocate for the role of emergency medicine practitioners in improving health outcomes in countries where emergency medicine is a developing speciality.
She graduated from Seth G.S. Medical College, Mumbai, India in 2002. She completed her core training in Emergency Medicine at Manchester Royal Infirmary and St Helens' and Knowsley Trust, UK and then moved to London where she completed her Fellowship in Emergency Medicine with a focus on global health and patient safety.
The recent Imperial College and The George Institute, UK partnership, has given her the opportunity to bring her academic and field work in global emergency care closer to home and she is delighted to be joining the dynamic and inspiring injury prevention team at The George Institute as a Senior Fellow.
DEEP DIVE: To end the silent epidemic of drowning, whose voice matters?
Dr Shane Galgey
Dr. Shane Galgey MB BCh BAO NUI MRCP MRCS is an Irish trained physician in Gastroenterology, Hepatology, General Internal Medicine, with subspecialty training in HDU and Emergency Medicine.
He is currently works in Academic Project Operations in the divisions of Critical Care and Respiratory Medicine as a Project Manager/CRA. He also works as a Medical Monitor and provides Safety and Medical Advisory for Academic Project Operations Trials in TGI.
He is a keen researcher across TGI’s many therapeutic areas. He has an interest in Health Systems Research, Thought Leadership, Process Implementation Improvement, and Social Entrepreneurship. He recently has contributed to the Institute’s response to COVID-19 and is the Lead Investigator in a report exploring how to optimise clinical trials in the face of change to achieve maximum outputs.
Shane also holds a Conjoint Lecturer Position at UNSW School of Medicine.
Dr Elizabeth Dunford
Elizabeth Dunford is a Project Consultant for The George Institute for Global Health’s Food Policy Division, Adjunct Senior Lecturer at the University of New South Wales and an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the University of North Carolina.
She is known internationally for her work in monitoring the global food supply and in the development of novel technologies to support this work in both developed and developing countries. She led the development of the Australian and US FoodSwitch food composition databases which are used to monitor changes in the nutritional composition of the food supply. The Australian database she developed in her PhD was used to create the FoodSwitch smartphone application; an innovative tool that helps consumers select healthier food choices. FoodSwitch has been downloaded >1,000,000 times and has been launched in multiple countries.
Elizabeth has an undergraduate degree in Human Nutrition, a Masters degree in Public Health, and a PhD in Public Health from The University of Sydney. In the 10 years following the completion of her postgraduate qualification in Public Health, Elizabeth has published 100+ peer-reviewed journal articles and has authored multiple commissioned policy documents for the World Health Organization, Access to Nutrition Initiative, World Bank and Unicef.