Welcome to the Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health (MISCH) Research Hub
Professor Julie Simpson, Director of MISCH
Welcome to the Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health (MISCH) Research Hub!
At MISCH, we're dedicated to providing expertise in research methods to ensure high quality and impactful clinical and health research.
Our collaborative platform includes experts in the research methods - Biostatistics, Clinical Epidemiology, Health Economics, Health Informatics (REDCap), and Co-Design and Consumer Involvement.
At MISCH, collaboration is key. Contact us to maximize your research impact!
How can we help maximise your research impact?
Training Opportunities
News
Upcoming Events
The Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health (MISCH) research Hub seeks to facilitate and collaborate to ensure researchers have access to the core research methods of Biostatistics and Clinical Epidemiology, Health Economics, Health Informatics (REDCap), Clinical Trials and Co-Design and Consumer Involvement. These areas are necessary for good research design and governance in order to generate research findings that lead to improved health care and informed health service reform.
View our collaboration agreement
Keep up to date with all MISCH news by subscribing to our newsletter
Featured content
-
Biostatistics and Clinical Epidemiology
Biostatistics underpins the sound application of statistical methods in clinical research.
-
Health Economics
Economic evaluation is widely used to assess many new health care interventions and technologies.
-
Health Informatics (REDCap)
Health Informatics ensures the optimal use of information, including REDCap database support to capture health and clinical data.
Featured content
-
Clinical Trials
Health-related interventions that seek to evaluate tests and treatments comprise Clinical Trial research. Mutually beneficial relationships and resources allow the University and partners to work together, sharing resources and knowledge.
-
Co-Design and Consumer Involvement
Supporting health and social services to use participatory and collaborative approaches for research, intervention co-design, and monitoring and evaluation to improve services, systems, and outcomes
-
Melbourne Academic Centre Health Node Health Studies Australian National Data Asset (HeSANDA)
Learn about the HeSANDA initiative, Health Data Australia and how to contribute your clinical trial metadata.
MISCH has a range of training opportunities available for researchers and students. From beginners and advanced REDcap workshops to seminars on a variety of topics relating to biostatistics, grants, health economics and co-design - there are many ways we can enable you to advance your skillset.
For any queries email misch-info@unimelb.edu.au.
Keep up to date with all MISCH news by subscribing to our newsletter
Upcoming training and events
On this page:
Professor Julie Simpson
Director of MISCH
Julie has 30 years experience as a biostatistician contributing to clinical and population health research. Previously she has worked at St Thomas's Hospital, London, Mahidol-Oxford Research Programme in Thailand, University of Aberdeen, and Cancer Council of Victoria. Her main research areas are: the integration of biostatistics and mathematical modelling to improve the control of infectious diseases and statistical methods for handling missing data in observational cohorts. Julie is Head of the Biostatistics Unit, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, and was awarded an NHMRC Investigator Grant (Leadership L1, 2021-5).
Professional Staff
Shaie O'Brien
Shaie is the MISCH Manager. With her background in both research administration and clinical trial coordination, Shaie has a strong track record in project and event management, communications, ethics and governance. Shaie holds a Bachelor of Arts and a Masters in International Relations from Monash University and has worked at the University of Melbourne for over 15 years.
Ms An Nguyen
An is the MISCH Operations Manager. She has extensive experience in financial accounting, project financial management and audit. An enjoys working with numbers and providing support to staff
Ms Katie Ozdowska
Katie is the MISCH Clinical Trials Node Manager and brings a wealth of experience in coordinating and conducting clinical trials across all phases, encompassing both investigator-initiated and sponsored clinical trials and health research projects. Her experience spans various medical disciplines, with a particular focus on innovative therapies and public health initiatives. Prior to her current role, Katie worked at the University of Melbourne's Department of Otolaryngology. There, she was responsible for the coordination of trials investigating cutting-edge treatments, including drug delivery systems, gene therapy applications and regenerative strategies for hearing protection and restoration Additionally, Katie has worked across in multiple trials addressing Indigenous ear health, through surgical and medical interventions. Katie holds a Bachelor degree in Nursing Science from the University of Southern Queensland and a Master’s degree in Public Health & Tropical Medicine from James Cook University.
Dr Sahar Bassal
Sahar is the Clinical Trials Manager across both MACH and the Melbourne Centre for Clinical Trials (MCCT) – with a focus on enhancing, coordinating and streamlining clinical trials across our partnership. Sahar is a seasoned pharmaceutical professional with over 15 years of comprehensive experience spanning multiple disciplines including regulatory affairs, pharmacovigilance, medical affairs, and clinical operations. Demonstrated success in leading cross-functional teams and managing complex projects across global pharmaceutical organizations. Expert in ensuring compliance with international regulatory requirements while driving operational excellence and patient safety initiatives. Proven track record in developing and implementing risk management strategies, clinical research oversight, and regulatory submissions across multiple jurisdictions.
Jessie Lu-Lee
Jessie is the MISCH Communications Coordinator. Jessie Lu-Lee is a Project Manager with extensive experience in the not-for-profit and health sectors. She currently manages James Beeson’s Malaria Synergy Program and Freya Fowke’s Australian Centre of Research Excellence in Malaria Elimination MASTER-MAP at the Burnet Institute, alongside her role with the MISCH Hub at the University of Melbourne. Jessie holds a Bachelor of Psychological Science from Deakin University (2016), a Graduate Diploma of Counselling (Child, Youth, and Family Therapy) from the University of Southern Queensland (2018), and a Diploma of Event Management from Holmesglen (2020). Her expertise in project management, stakeholder engagement, and health program coordination continues to contribute to impactful initiatives in public health and research.
Biostatistics and Clinical Epidemiology
Associate Professor Sabine Braat
Sabine completed her postgraduate training in Belgium (Master of Science in Biostatistics preceded by Master in Applied Mathematics) following undergraduate study in mathematics. She has over 15 years’ experience working as a statistician in the pharmaceutical industry in the Netherlands where she contributed to the design, analysis and reporting of clinical trials ranging from the early clinical phases (Phase II) to post-marketing (Phase IV) in a range of medical areas.
Associate Professor Karen Lamb
Karen has a BSc (Hons) in Statistics from the University of Glasgow, Scotland and a PhD in Mathematics and Statistics from the University of Strathclyde, Scotland where her research focused on the mathematical and statistical modelling of pneumococcal carriage following vaccine intervention. Karen has been employed as a biostatistician in public health research for more than 10 years. She has previously worked at the MRC Social & Public Health Sciences Unit in Glasgow, the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne and the Institute for Physical Activity and Nutrition at Deakin University in Melbourne. She has experience providing statistical support in the design, analysis and reporting of observational studies, quasi-experimental studies and randomised controlled trials.
Associate Professor Emily Karahalios
Emily completed her Honours Bachelor of Science from the University of Toronto, Canada, and Master of Public Health and PhD in Epidemiology & Biostatistics from the University of Melbourne. Emily is a Senior Lecturer in Biostatistics in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, the University of Melbourne and is the coordinator for the Master of Biostatistics and Deputy Head of the Biostatistics Unit. Emily’s expertise is in the statistical methods for systematic reviews (i.e. pairwise and network meta-analysis). She is a member of Cochrane and statistical editor for the Cochrane Incontinence Group. She has previously worked in the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, as clinical biostatistician at Western Health, and at Cancer Council of Victoria.
Dr Anurika de Silva
Anurika has a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Statistics (Hons) from the University of Colombo, Sri Lanka and a PhD in Biostatistics from the University of Melbourne, Australia. Her PhD involved the evaluation of multiple imputation methods for handling missing longitudinal data. She has worked in public health research for 2 years and her expertise is in the statistical analyses of randomised controlled trials and observational studies. She is also currently the course coordinator for the Master of Public Health course on Linear and Logistic Regression. Previously, she has worked as an Assistant Lecturer at the University of Colombo, Sri Lanka.
Dr Digsu Koye
Digsu has a Bachelor of Science in Public Health and Master of Public Health in Epidemiology and Biostatistics from the University of Gondar, Ethiopia and PhD in Epidemiology from Monash University, Australia. He is an experienced clinical epidemiologist with a strong biostatistical background in the design and analysis of clinical and epidemiological studies in the fields of metabolic and chronic diseases. Before his move to Australia for his PhD, Digsu had been teaching and conducting public health research at the Institute of Public Health of the University of Gondar.
Ms Phoebe Fitzpatrick
Phoebe recently completed a Masters of Biostatistics, having previously completed a Bachelor of Science majoring in Applied Mathematics and a Diploma of Languages in Italian, all at the University of Melbourne. Prior to joining MISCH, she worked in data management as a research assistant at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute (WEHI) where she managed the entire lifecycle of clinical trials. At MISCH she is currently working on multiple global health trials, both observational and randomized control trials which span many fields including maternal and neonatal health, Aboriginal health and infectious diseases.
Dr Rob Mahar
Rob received a PhD in Biostatistics at the University of Melbourne in 2019 following his completion of a Master of Biostatistics at the University of Queensland in 2014. He is a statistician with a research focus on applied Bayesian methods, and novel experimental design and analysis, particularly for adaptive clinical trials and sequentially multiple assignment randomised trials. His doctoral research focused on developing new models of lung function from multiple-breath washout and complex tidal flow waveform data, with an emphasis on computational Bayesian and spectral analytical methods. Prior to undertaking his graduate studies, he was a professional economist with a focus on both domestic and international housing and retail markets.
Dr Alistair McLean
Alistair is a Research Fellow in Biostatistics. He completed his PhD in malaria immuno-epidemiology at the University of Melbourne in 2016. He has experience providing statistical support and training in the design, analysis, interpretation and reporting of observational studies and randomised controlled trials. Prior to joining MISCH, Alistair worked as a biostatistician at the Myanmar Oxford Clinical Research Unit and as a postdoctoral research scientist with the Infectious Diseases Data Observatory, University of Oxford.
Dr Sophie Zaloumis
Sophie has a BSc (Hon) in Statistics and a PhD in Statistics from the University of Melbourne. Her PhD project focused on Bayesian hierarchical modelling and extending statistical methods to analyse ordinal categorical family data. Sophie has been employed as a biostatistician in public health research for more than 10 years. She has experience providing statistical support in the analysis and reporting of observational studies, pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic modelling and applying Bayesian inference approaches.
Ms Fiona McManus
Fiona McManus is a Research Assistant in Biostatistics at the University of Melbourne. She worked for several years as a physiotherapist in various public and private settings and as a physiotherapy research assistant at the Centre for Health, Exercise and Sports Medicine (CHESM), Department of Physiotherapy, Melbourne School of Health Sciences. Fiona completed a Master of Public Health (Epidemiology and Biostatistics stream) in 2015 and a Master of Biostatistics in 2020. She joined the Biostatistics node of the Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health research hub in 2021, where she works on collaborative research projects, including randomised controlled trials, with Professor Kim Bennell and her team at CHESM.
Ms Diana Zannino
Diana is a biostatistician with over 15 years’ experience working across many fields in clinical research. She completed a Master of Science by Research in Applied Statistics at the University of Melbourne and started her biostatistics career at the NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre, University of Sydney. Upon returning to Melbourne, she worked in the biostatistics unit at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and then later joined the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute to provide statistical support to the Heart Research Team.
Peixuan Li
Peixuan is a Research Assistant in Biostatistics. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Neuroscience (2020) and a Master of Biostatistics (2022) from the University of Melbourne. Peixuan completed her Master of Biostatistics Research Project at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne, focusing on investigating inflammation and metabolic risk profiles in the social gradient of cardiovascular disease in Australian children. Since joining MISCH in 2022, Peixuan has been actively involved in a range of collaborative clinical research projects, providing statistical support to observational studies and randomised controlled trials.
Dr Yee-Foong Mok
Foong has a PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and a Masters in Biostatistics from the University of Melbourne. He previously worked in a research laboratory in the Department of Biochemistry and Pharmacology and Bio21 Institute at the University of Melbourne, analysing how molecules in our cells interact to cause disease. He decided to make a career shift into biostatistics, and is currently enjoying the transition from analysing data at the resolution of atoms to making inferences at the level of human populations.
Professor Leonid Churilov
Leonid is an internationally recognized expert in the use of health analytics and statistical modelling for decision support in clinical and health care systems. He is an Associate Editor of the “Operations Research for Health Care” and an Editorial Board member for four other journals. He contributes biostatistical, health analytics, and decision modelling expertise to several large international clinical trials and to a number of smaller pre-clinical, clinical, imaging, and service evaluation studies in the areas of general neurology, stroke, epilepsy, spinal cord injury, diabetes, gynaecology, and anaesthesia.
Dr Freda Werdiger
Dr Freda Werdiger is a Biostatistics and Brain Imaging Research Fellow with the Melbourne Medical School. Currently, her main area of research involves developing adaptive clinical trial designs for stroke research and other applications. In addition, Freda has expertise in image-based research, having worked with many research groups that employ both lung and brain imaging for healthcare research. She holds a BSc in Computational Mathematics and Physics and a PhD in Physics from Monash University, and her research career spans the basic, pre-clinical and clinical sciences.
Dr Odkhishig Ganbold
Odko is a junior biostatistician at the Department of Medicine (RMH), Melbourne Medical School, University of Melbourne, holds a PhD in Operations Management and currently pursuing a PhD in Biostatistics. Her research focuses on adaptive master protocols in early-phase trials for post-stroke recovery, utilising in silico statistical simulations to explore efficient designs. She also contributes to diabetes research at ACADI, providing statistical support and developing a KNIME pipeline for Continuous Glucose Monitoring metrics. Additionally, she offers statistical expertise for clinical research in obstetrics and gynaecology. Before joining the University of Melbourne, she led multi-modal data analysis projects, working with eye-tracking, pupillometry, EEG, and EDA data. She also developed optimisation models for logistics and resource allocation at the commercial arm of the National University of Singapore.
Mr Dominic Italiano
Dominic is a Research Fellow in Biostatistics who joined Melbourne Brain Centre at Royal Melbourne Hospital in September 2021. He graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics and Statistics (2017) and Master of Biostatistics (2021) from the University of Melbourne. Dom is involved in collaborative clinical research projects across Melbourne Medical School through providing statistical and methodological support. He works closely with clinical researchers and contributes to the communication of research findings via scientific publications.
Dr Hannah Jones
Hannah is a Biostatistician with an interest in novel statistical methods and trial designs for the study, analysis and delivery of stroke care. She is a recognised expert in the use of statistical and machine learning, and regularly provides statistical and technical support to a range of clinical projects, and is responsible for the implementation of adaptive randomisation procedures in several stroke trials. Hannah is a current member of the executive of the Australasian Stroke Trials Network and has developed and contributed statistical software to the Comprehensive R Archive Network.
Biostatistics and Clinical Epidemiology
Affiliates
Ms Ximena Camacho
Ximena has extensive experience using linked health administrative databases to generate policy-relevant evidence. She has worked across a variety of fields including cancer, aging and cardiovascular studies, and her current work is focused on using real-world data to assess medicines safety. Ximena collaborates regularly with clinical, government and academic partners and has both local and international networks. She has held former roles with the Centre for Digital Transformation of Health (University of Melbourne) and Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (Canada’s largest independent steward of linked population health data).
Associate Professor Patty Chondros
Patty is a biostatistician specialising in primary care and health services research. She is the lead biostatistician within Primary Clinical Trials Unit based at the Department of General Practice. As lead biostatistician she provides statistical leadership and expertise to support the department’s research programs, including grants and publications, and to advance the methodological and statistical skills and capacity of researchers and research higher degree students. Her research interests include the design and analysis of randomised controlled trials, particularly cluster randomised and stepped wedge designs.
Konstancja Densley
Konstancja is a Research Fellow at the Dept. of General Practice and Primary Care. She previously worked as a researcher and national database coordinator in the Dept. of Psychiatry. Konstancja has contributed to multiple mental health research projects, including diamond, CORE, Target D, Assertive Care, Link Me, IMPACT, and Neami National Implementation. She has also worked on COVID-related projects such as CovidCare and COVIDDA, managing mobile app data, and monitoring participants' mental and physical health. Currently, she is involved in Wiser AD, Carers Victoria, Living Labs, Link Me Head to Health, and ALIVE National Centre for Mental Health Research Translation projects. She is responsible for managing study databases and conducting statistical analyses, including Rasch and Structural Equation Modelling.”
Adrian Laughlin
Adrian is a Biostatistician in the Department of General Practice and Primary Care at the University of Melbourne, having completed a Master of Biostatistics in 2023. Adrian’s role involves advising research teams regarding optimisation of trial design and data collection methods, conducting analyses for randomised controlled trials and observational studies, and supporting students at all levels in conducting research projects within the DGPPC. Prior to joining the DGPPC in 2021, Adrian has worked in a variety of fields across various organisations including human factors at the Defence Science and Technology Group, injury prevention at the Victorian Injury Surveillance Unit at Monash University, and child and adolescent health and development at the Parenting Research Centre. He also has experience in trial and project management, managing the Promoting Resilience in Nurses RCT, a collaboration between Australian Cathoic University and NorthWestern Mental Health at Royal Melbourne Hospital. His statistical and methodological areas of interest and expertise include (cluster) randomised controlled trials, observational studies, causal inference, hierarchical models, electronic medical record data, and the estimand framework.
Associate Professor David Price
David is a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Infectious Diseases and Melbourne School of Population & Global Health, at the University of Melbourne. His primary research interests are in the development and application of statistical methods for the study of infectious diseases, particularly regarding the optimal use of resources in experimental and observational studies. He works on infectious diseases across multiple scales, from within-host infection dynamics to multi-site clinical trials and population-level epidemiological modelling and analysis. At the Doherty Institute, he is co-lead of the Computational Sciences & Genomics Cross-Cutting Discipline and leads a team providing collaborative statistical and modelling expertise to a breadth of infection & immunity research.
Peta Edler
Peta is a Research Assistant (Biostatistics) in the Department of Infectious Diseases, The University of Melbourne, at The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, supervised by Dr David Price. She joined David’s team upon completion of her Masters in Biostatistics in 2021 and collaborates with clinical and laboratory researchers to provide statistical support and advice, from study design to analysis, reporting and interpretation. Her work has spanned from analysing immunological responses to COVID-19 and Influenza to designing studies to evaluate new diagnostic tests to developing a Shiny app to assist with country-specific treatment dosing for Plasmodium vivax malaria.
Niamh Meagher
Niamh Meagher is a biostatistician and research fellow in the Department of Infectious Disease at the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection & Immunity. She completed her Master of Biostatistics at the University of Melbourne in 2019 after completing a Bachelor of Science Advanced with Honours at Monash University in 2015. At the Doherty Institute, Niamh has collaborated with clinicians and scientists on clinical trials, observational studies and laboratory studies in multiple areas of infection and immunity research. She has a particular interest in improving the design and analytical methods applied to household transmission investigations of novel pathogens.
Nadine Phillips
Nadine has been working for the Centre for Health Policy since 2023, analysing equity in access to clinical genetics services for Indigenous Australians. Before this, she was a mathematics teacher and decided to make a career shift into biostatistics.
Health Economics and Health Services Research
Associate Professor An Duy Tran
An is Head of the Health Economics and Simulation Modelling for Chronic Disease (HESC) Unit at the Centre of Health Policy. His expertise includes design of economic evaluation studies alongside clinical trials, statistical analyses of costs and health outcomes, development of decision-analytic models for cost-effectiveness and cost-utility analyses, and development of patient-level simulation models to estimate the long-term impact of treatment strategies on health outcomes and healthcare resource utilisation in patients with chronic disease. He is the sole creator of the world’s first online application for decision analysis and modelling, which has been used by researchers in over 65 countries and as a tool for teaching modelling at the University of Melbourne.
Professor Kim Dalziel
Kim is Head of the Health Economics Unit of 20 researchers at the University of Melbourne. She was awarded an NHMRC Investigator Award (2021-25) and is a Dame Kate Campbell Fellow in Research Excellence with the University of Melbourne (2020-24). Kim has skills in leading health economics research, building health economics models, health technology assessment, patient-reported outcomes measurement and health services research. She specialises in child health. She has made significant contributions to the area of economic evaluation alongside paediatric clinical trials.
Mr Dennis La
Dennis is a research assistant at the Health Economics Unit, where he will be assisting with projects involving the economic evaluation of new technologies for diabetes and chronic kidney disease. Dennis has a Master of Public Health from the University of Melbourne and has worked as a Research Assistant in the OneHealth Unit at The Nossal Institute for Global Health. As part of his master's degree, he undertook a research project that investigated the associations between multimorbidity and out-of-pocket expenditures for medicines in India and China. He has published this work as a first author in the BMJ Global Health.
Dr Peter Lee
Dr Peter Lee is a Research Fellow within the Health Economics and Simulation Modelling for Chronic Disease (HESC) Unit at the Centre for Health Policy, and the Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health (MISCH) research hub. His research focuses on the health economics of cardiovascular disease and chronic conditions such as diabetes and COPD. Dr Lee has considerable expertise in conducting economic evaluations alongside clinical trials, developing decision analytic models for cost-effectiveness analyses, and assessing the burden of diseases. He has led projects that aimed to enhance health policy decision-making by incorporating health equity into economic evaluations and developing open-source economic models that can be rapidly adapted across various health conditions.
Bianca Lau-Goodchild
Bianca Lau-Goodchild is a Research Assistant within the Health Economics and Simulation Modelling for Chronic Disease (HESC) Unit at the Centre for Health Policy, and the Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health (MISCH) research hub. She holds a Master of Global Health with High Distinction from the University of Sydney, and a Bachelor of Biomedical Science with First-Class Honour from Monash University. In her current position, she supports the collection of health economic data, conducts literature reviews, and performs data analyses for a series of successful projects funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF). Prior to her current role, Bianca has worked as a Research Assistant at the University of Sydney, where she contributed to data analysis and management of projects in public health.
Health Informatics
Professor Douglas Iain Ross Boyle
Dougie is the Director of the Research Information Technology Unit (R2). Since 2006 Doug has been researching, developing and implementing systems for the ethical acquisition of record-linkable data for audit, research and health surveillance. Consent management, security and privacy-protecting record linkage are key components and research areas. The software systems (GRHANITE™) are now responsible for the largest collections of record-linkable primary care data ever accumulated in Australia. Prior to emigrating from Scotland in 2006, Doug worked in a similar capacity to develop and implement technologies for wide-scale data acquisition. His system SCI-DC Network is internationally recognised and is playing a continuing key role in the support of population-based diabetes health service provision across Scotland.
Mr David Ormiston-Smith
David provides Health Informatics expertise to MISCH. David has experience with Natural Language Technologies (Python, web, data-mining, nlp) and supports REDCap users.
Health Informatics Affiliates
Associate Professor Adrian Bickerstaffe
Adrian completed his PhD in machine learning (2009) at Monash University, Australia, following a Bachelor of Computer Science (Hons; 2002) from the same institution. He leads a specialised health Informatics Team that is based in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, the University of Melbourne. He has a proven track record in research software and systems development, focusing on integrated software for research data management and research translation to practice via online decision support tools. Adrian champions informatics as an academically recognised, embedded component of contemporary research methods.
Sam Fox
Sam Fox is Deputy Head of the MSPGH Informatics Team with over 10 years organisational experience in health research. Sam has extensive systems knowledge which she uses to understand the role of research data, determine system requirements, and initiate informatics processes to deliver innovative technical solutions. Sam enjoys designing and delivering sophisticated bespoke, replicable solutions to the novel and evolving problems that arise from contemporary health research.
Dr Alfie Punnoose
Alfie is a Research Software Engineer working in The Melbourne School of Population and Global Health (MSPGH). He has worked at the School since 2022 as a member of the MSPGH Informatics Team based the Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics. He has experience in designing, building and managing integrated data management solutions and other software systems in the academic research and tertiary education sectors. He specialises in REDCap API integrations and bespoke software development. He supports projects for the Indigenous Health Unit, Colon Cancer Family Registry, and Twins Research Australia, among others.
Hannah Murchie
Hannah is a Research Data Manager within the MSPGH Informatics Team, providing research-enabling support to groups across the School and beyond. Hannah completed a Bachelor of Science at UWA, a Graduate Diploma in Reproductive Science at Monash, and a Master of Public Health at UNSW. She has previously worked as the Project Coordinator for the National HPV Monitoring Program, and with a not-for-profit drug development and clinical trials group. Hannah has extensive experience in data management for large cohort and longitudinal studies, front-end data capture, data linkage, relational databases, Microsoft Power Apps, REDCap, Python, and more.
Chris Evans
Chris is a Health Informatics Officer in the Informatics Team at the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health. He has worked at the School since 2010, primarily in registry-based research, before joining the Informatics Team in 2023. He specialises in REDCap database design, data management, SQL, and web-based solutions that facilitate health research. He supports projects for the Indigenous Health Unit and the Colorectal Cancer Family Registry and provides data management support for clinical malaria studies based at the Menzies School of Health Research.
Co-Design and Consumer Involvement
Professor Cathy Vaughan
Cathy is Director of the Nossal Institute for Global Health, Chair of Global Health at the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health and Director of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Women’s Health. In addition to her internationally recognised program of research on violence against women in Australia, Asia, and the Pacific, she has extensive experience in working to co-design health and social interventions in a range of complex settings with members of migrant, refugee, and faith communities; people with disability; service providers and health practitioners; and women with lived experience of violence. She has particular expertise in qualitative and visual research methods, in community-based participatory research, and in strengthening research capacity.
Ms Mary Stathopoulos
Mary is a research assistant in the Gender and Women’s Health Unit, and the Methods and Implementation Support Clinical and Health (MISCH) Research Hub. As a qualitative researcher with experience in sexual violence research utilising participatory research methods, Mary has worked on projects exploring how to engage men in primary prevention, identification of immigrant and refugee women’s service needs post-settlement period, as well as managed research on victim/survivor justice responses and reforms in criminal court practice. She has also conducted research for the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse interviewing adult survivors of childhood institutional abuse and their families about disclosures of abuse, and pathways to support services.
Ms Jess Kirwan
Jess is a research assistant in the Gender and Women’s Health Unit, and the Methods and Implementation Support Clinical and Health (MISCH) Research Hub. She has a Master of Public Health and has experience engaging with a wide range of stakeholders through research and evaluation projects relating to gender-based violence. Jess has a background in social work in the specialist family violence sector and experience providing trauma-informed support to victim/survivors of family violence and sexual assault.
Clinical Trials
Associate Professor Adam Deane
Adam is an Intensivist with research interests including pragmatic clinical trials and outcomes from critical illness. He currently serves as Senior Staff Specialist, Head of Intensive Care Unit Research, and Deputy Director Intensive Care Unit at The Royal Melbourne Hospital. Adam currently holds a Career Development Fellowship (Level 2 clinical) with the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC).
Ms Katie Ozdowska
Katie is the MISCH Clinical Trials Node Manager and brings a wealth of experience in coordinating and conducting clinical trials across all phases, encompassing both investigator-initiated and sponsored clinical trials and health research projects. Her experience spans various medical disciplines, with a particular focus on innovative therapies and public health initiatives. Prior to her current role, Katie worked at the University of Melbourne's Department of Otolaryngology. There, she was responsible for the coordination of trials investigating cutting-edge treatments, including drug delivery systems, gene therapy applications and regenerative strategies for hearing protection and restoration Additionally, Katie has worked across in multiple trials addressing Indigenous ear health, through surgical and medical interventions. Katie holds a Bachelor degree in Nursing Science from the University of Southern Queensland and a Master’s degree in Public Health & Tropical Medicine from James Cook University.
Dr Sahar Bassal
Sahar is the Clinical Trials Manager across both MACH and the Melbourne Centre for Clinical Trials (MCCT) – with a focus on enhancing, coordinating and streamlining clinical trials across our partnership. Sahar is a seasoned pharmaceutical professional with over 15 years of comprehensive experience spanning multiple disciplines including regulatory affairs, pharmacovigilance, medical affairs, and clinical operations. Demonstrated success in leading cross-functional teams and managing complex projects across global pharmaceutical organizations. Expert in ensuring compliance with international regulatory requirements while driving operational excellence and patient safety initiatives. Proven track record in developing and implementing risk management strategies, clinical research oversight, and regulatory submissions across multiple jurisdictions.