Professor Berwanger leads the Institute’s work in the UK in partnership with Imperial College London, with a core focus on health systems science, multimorbidity, women’s health, large-scale clinical trials and planetary health. He is also building on his personal research interests in exploring innovative clinical trial models, as well as the conduct of efficient implementation science studies.

Prior to joining The George Institute, he was Director of the Academic Research Organisation (ARO) of the Albert Einstein Israelite Hospital in São Paulo, Brazil. An esteemed cardiologist and clinical trialist, Professor Berwanger has extensive research and managerial experience and has led large-scale, randomised clinical trials nationally and internationally across many countries including Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, China, Chile, Argentina, Peru and Colombia. Trials led by him have been published in high-impact journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine, The Lancet, JAMA and the BMJ.

Professor Jane Hirst is Chair in Global Women’s Health at The George Institute for Global Health, UK, and the School of Public Health at Imperial College. She is also Visiting Professor in Global Women's Health at the University of Oxford and Honorary Consultant Obstetrician, Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

She is an active clinical researcher with projects focussed on global women’s health and investigating novel approaches to improve health care delivery. She has a particular interest in preventing cardiometabolic complications in women after high-risk pregnancy conditions such as gestational diabetes and preeclampsia.

Professor Hirst is a UKRI Future Leaders Fellow. Her Fellowship title is “Pregnancy as an opportunity to improve women’s lifelong health”. She is PI for the SMART Health Pregnancy trial in India. This trial is being conducted in two rural districts in two states, and is evaluating a community-based intervention and digital clinical decision support tool to improve screening, management and referral of high risk conditions during pregnancy and in the in first year after birth.

Dr Kotwal is a clinical nephrologist at the Prince of Wales Hospital in Sydney; Program Head of the Renal and Metabolic Division at The George Institute for Global Health and a Conjoint Senior Lecturer at UNSW. Her research interests include novel and pragmatic clinical trials and she is passionate about increasing clinical trial access for patients with kidney disease and personalised medicine. Dr Kotwal is the Academic Project Director for the GKPTN and the principal investigator for the Glomerular Disease Registry and Biobank in Sydney. She has expertise in translating research into clinical practice and in-depth knowledge of statistical techniques, epidemiology and clinical trial design.

Christine Jenkins is Program Head, Respiratory at The George Institute for Global Health; Professor of Respiratory Medicine at UNSW Sydney and Clinical Professor in the Concord Clinical School, University of Sydney.

Christine has been Principal Investigator and has led many investigator-initiated and competitively funded clinical trials in airways disease. Christine recently retired from clinical practice but continues to teach and supervise medical students and higher degree postgraduate students. She has had major roles in advocacy and leadership for lung health in Australia, most recently chairing Lung Foundation Australia, where she continues as a director, and previously chairing the National Asthma Campaign and the Federal Government’s National Asthma Advisory Group. She has participated in many government advisory groups and guidelines and implementation initiatives to enhance resources, skills, capacity and clinical outcomes in airways disease.

Christine’s area of research interest is the clinical management of airways disease and patient-reported outcomes in response to therapeutic interventions, and she is currently implementing trials in asthma and COPD management and pulmonary rehabilitation in Australia and Asia. Her current work has also examined the role of telemedicine in specialist care during the pandemic and she is overseeing an ambitious study to develop a digital application for primary care to improve the diagnosis and evidence-based management of breathlessness.

In 2002 Christine was made a Member of the Order of Australia in recognition of services to respiratory medicine as a physician, administrator and educator, especially in the field of asthma education. In 2022, she was awarded the Governor General’s Medallion by His Excellency General the Honourable David Hurley AC DSC. This award recognises significant contributions to charities during the 2020 and 2021 pandemic years and is in recognition of Christine’s volunteer expertise, generosity, and exceptional leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic as Chair of Lung Foundation Australia.

Christine is a member and previous president of the Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand, and a member of the American Thoracic Society, European Respiratory Society and the Asia-Pacific Society of Respirology.

Bala Venkatesh is Director of Intensive care at the Wesley Hospital, Pre-Eminent specialist in Intensive Care Medicine at the Princess Alexandra Hospital, Brisbane, Professor of Intensive Care Medicine at the University of Queensland, and. at the University of New South Wales, and Professorial Fellow at the George Institute for Global Health, Sydney Australia. He is the Chairman of the Queensland Health Statewide Sepsis Steering Committee. He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences

He has completed Fellowship training in Internal Medicine, Anaesthesia and Intensive Care Medicine.  He then undertook a research degree from the University of Birminghan, UK which led to the award of an MD.  He pioneered the development of a continuous blood gas monitoring system which reached clinical application.

He served as the President for the College of Intensive Care Medicine of Australia and New Zealand between 2014-2016.  He led the international taskforce on gender equity in Intensive Care which influenced guidelines in the World federation of Intensive Care. As President of the College of Intensive Care, he led the task force on bullying and discrimination which have informed College policy.

He led the NHMRC funded multi-center international ADRENAL trial which is largest septic shock trial to date. This was published in the New England Journal of Medicine and ranked in the top 12 articles of 2018. He has served on several  Data Safety Monitoring Committees and on the Management committee of RCTs in sepsis. His research interests include glucocorticoid physiology in critical illness including the development of the idea of the "sick euadrenal state, sepsis and vitamin D in critical illness.

In 2020, following the Covid-19 pandemic, he contributed to the REMAP-CAP steroid trial design and development and was on its writing committee recently reported in JAMA, which influenced guideline development. He was instrumental in the development of the George Institute’s Covid-19 research program in India and played a  key role in the set up of the COVID Steroid 2 trial in India which was also published in JAMA. He is currently investigating the role of fludrocortisone in septic shock.

He has published more than 250 papers, 40 book chapters, and edited 2 books. He has supervised 8 PhD students. He is now a Level 3 NHMRC Investigator Fellow.

Professorial Fellow in the Critical Care Division at The George Institute for Global Health, Adjunct Professor, University of New South Wales and Professor of Critical Care, School of Public Health, Imperial College London.  

Simon leads the Sepsis Research Program at The George Institute which is focussed on the design and conduct of robust high-quality RCTs that will reduce death and disability due to sepsis in Australia and around the world.

Simon has obtained over $50M in research funding and authored or co-authored over 250 peer-reviewed papers with 20% of those in the highest-ranking medical journals. He served as a guest editor for the New England Journal of Medicine from 2012 to 2014 and is currently an editor of the Oxford Textbook of Critical Care and the Critical Care Section Editor of the Oxford Textbook of Medicine.

Simon was a founding member and is a past-Chair of the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society (ANZICS) Clinical Trials Group, past chair of the International Sepsis Forum, and past Vice President of the Global Sepsis Alliance. He is the Director of the Australian Sepsis Network and Asia Pacific Sepsis Alliance.

A Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences, Simon was appointed an Officer (AO) in the Order of Australia in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List 2020 for “distinguished service to intensive care medicine, to medical research and education, and to global health institutes”

Dorrilyn Rajbhandari is a Senior Project Manager at the George Institute for Global Health. She is chair of the Project Manager Interest Group, and a member of the ANZICS Clinical Trial Group. As a Senior Project Manager, with many years of experience as a nurse clinician in intensive care research, she has vast experience in clinical trial management, operationalisation of protocols, including protocol development and design, CRF design, website and data management, multiple sub-studies, final analysis and resulting publications. She is a resource and mentor for colleagues.

Dorrilyn has successfully coordinated and managed many multi-centre, worldwide clinical trials in intensive care. She has successfully completed, within expected timelines, the CHEST study (7000 patients), ADRENAL study, a 3,800 patient study from 70 sites worldwide, including the ADRENAL-GEPS Sub-Study, with the largest severe sepsis cohort in precision medicine. The process provided experience in drug manufacture, regulatory requirements and regulatory approvals in multiple countries including importation and exportation processes and requirements, sample collections and transfers from around the world. Dorrilyn is currently project managing a number of studies; BLING III multicentre clinical outcome study, a 7000 patient study from 100 sites around the world. FluDReSS, a 300 patient study from 10 sites. HOPE, hydroxycholoquine prophylaxis in health care workers in India. 

Dorrilyn Rajbhandari has the expertise to implement, manage and complete efficiently within timelines, large multi-centre clinical trials with results published in high quality journals.

Professor Craig Anderson is Professor of Neurology and Epidemiology, Faculty of Medicine, UNSW Sydney, and is in part-time clinical practice as a neurologist at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney, Australia.  

Craig holds specialist qualifications in clinical neurology and geriatrics, a PhD in medicine and epidemiology from The University of Western Australia, and is a Senior Investigator Fellow of the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) of Australia.  He is a past President of the Asia Pacific Stroke Organisation and the Stroke Society of Australasia, and is a member of several specialist societies and an editor for the Cochrane Stroke Group.  He has published widely on the clinical and epidemiological aspects of stroke, cardiovascular disease and aged care, and has led several large-scale investigator-initiated epidemiological and clinical trials that have had a major influence on clinical practice guidelines for stroke treatment and prevention.