Migrant and Refugee Advisory Group

Jane Yelland is a health service researcher and maternal epidemiologist and has a keen interest in improving the health and wellbeing of socially disadvantaged families during and after pregnancy She has established cross-cultural research methods to foster participation of populations considered ‘harder to reach’. She is co-leading a research program at MCRI that is working in partnership with refugee and migrant communities, health services and policy makers to undertake participatory, co-designed health services research with a focus on systems innovation, implementation and integrated knowledge translation. 

vicki.flenady@mater.uq.edu.au

Professor Vicki Flenady leads the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Centre of Research Excellence which aims to reduce stillbirths and improve care for families when a child is stillborn through high quality research and raising community awareness.  Vicki was lead author on The Lancet’s stillbirth series in 2011 and 2016. Vicki’s research currently focused on stillbirth prevention through better understanding of causal pathways and risk factors and is currently leading a large-scale trial on a mobile phone app for women on fetal movements to reduce stillbirth rates. With a clinical background in midwifery and neonatal nursing and masters and PhD in perinatal epidemiology in stillbirth prevention, Vicki has a keen interest in addressing evidence practice gaps in maternity care. Vicki is an active member of the International Stillbirth Alliance. 

philippa.middleton@sahmri.com

Philippa Middleton is a Principal Research Fellow in the Healthy Mothers, Babies and Children Theme of the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) and an Affiliate Associate Professor, School of Medicine, The University of Adelaide.  As a perinatal epidemiologist and implementation scientist, she specialises in randomised controlled trials, systematic reviews, research synthesis, guidelines, research reporting standards and translating research evidence into policy and practice. Her areas of expertise include preterm birth, nutrition, diabetes, stillbirth and health disparities, and she has a particular interest in Indigenous health.

Danielle Muscat, B.Psych. (Hons: Class 1), PhD, is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow and Westmead Lead of the Sydney Health Literacy Lab. 

Dr Muscat’s work is focused on improving health literacy among socially disadvantaged groups to empower them to be active participants in decisions about their health. Her doctoral work involved the development and evaluation of a world-first health literacy program for Australian adults attending adult basic literacy courses at TAFE across New South Wales.

Dr Muscat has continued this work in her post-doctoral role he currently leads a projects to improve health literacy for Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) and new parents in the diverse communities of western Sydney.

Dr Muscat is an active member of the Health Literacy Research Network, and the Health Literacy Node at the Charles Perkins Centre at the University of Sydney. In 2019, she was appointed as an Advisor on Health Literacy to the World Health Organization. She has also been involved in teaching students throughout her career, including teaching graduate and post-graduate coursework units in decision-making and health literacy, and acting in a supervisory role for University of Sydney research students.

Academic Institute: Sydney Health Literacy Lab, University of Sydney

Research Interests: Dr Muscat’s research interests includehealth literacy, decision-making, and patient-provider communication, with a particular focus on improving the quality of health communication and decision support for socially disadvantaged, lower literacy populations.

Stillbirth CRE project: Within the Stillbirth CRE, Dr Muscat is leading a pilot study of a group-based health literacy program to reduce stillbirth in culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) groups in western Sydney.

Email address: danielle.muscat@sydney.edu.au

Dr Elisha Riggs is a Senior Research Fellow and Co-leader Refugee and Migrant Research Program, Intergenerational Group, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and Honorary Senior Fellow, Department of General Practice, University of Melbourne. Dr Riggs is a public health researcher with expertise in the co-design and evaluation of public health interventions informed by community and service engagement. Collaborative and participatory approaches to research and knowledge exchange underpin her work in addressing inequalities and promoting health equity.

Email: elisha.riggs@mcri.edu.au

Joyce has a Bachelor of Medicine/Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS), a Master of Public Health (MPH) and a PhD in Family and Work Studies. She has over 20 years’ international experience across diverse fields, having worked as a registered practitioner, manager, researcher and educator. Joining MCWH in 2013, Joyce has been holding the role of Health Promotion Manager since and oversees the success of health education programs and health promotion projects covering many issues, including sexual and reproductive health, alcohol and drug and gambling related harm, and end-of-life caring. Joyce is passionate about population health, gender inequality and public health policy.

Research Interests: population health, gender inequality and public health policy, care-giving and caregivers

I am a Senior Lecturer in the School of Psychology at the University of Adelaide. My research concerns the health and wellbeing of vulnerable or ‘under-researched’ groups of people and I am particularly interested in the social determinants of mental health, including grief and loss. In particular, my research concerns the health and wellbeing of people with refugee and migrant backgrounds. My research in relation to stillbirth focuses on bereavement care for people who are newly arrived in Australia, especially those with refugee backgrounds, as well as siblings, men and grandparents. I am committed to working in partnership with people from the communities with whom I work to ensure that my research reflects the needs of those communities and will lead to positive outcomes.

Research Interests: Bereavement care following stillbirth

Stillbirth CRE project: Migrant and Refugee advisory group; Parent guideline steering group

Email address: clemence.due@adelaide.edu.au

Professor Jaya Dantas is Dean International in the Faculty of Health Sciences, Curtin University and Professor of International Health, in the School of Public Health where she leads a programme of research in refugee and migrant health. Jaya was Director of Graduate Studies in the Faculty of Health Sciences between 2011 and 2017 and chaired the Faculty Research Training Committee.

Jaya has worked for 34 years in India, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Australia and has undertaken teaching and research in Pakistan, Timor-Leste, Sri Lanka, Singapore and South Africa. In 2010, she was awarded a National Award for University Teaching by the Australian Learning and Teaching Council, in 2013, she was made a Fellow of the Public Health Association of Australia. She has been a delegate of Graduate Women International to the Commission on the Status of Women at the United Nations from 2015 onwards.

Her central research interests focus on the consequences of post-conflict adversity on women and youth; resilience among refugee and migrant populations, health equity, the social determinants of health, and participatory research. Jaya's research uses rights based participatory approaches to understanding health and social inequalities. She is experienced in international mixed methods field based research especially in post-conflict nations comprising household surveys, rapid ethnographic assessments and community engagement having undertaken research in Rwanda, Uganda, Timor Leste and Sri Lanka.

Jaya is currently involved in three projects: 1) EMPOWER: Peer-Mentoring of Refugee Women in Western Australia; 2) SAMBA: Physical Activity program for South Asian and Middle Eastern Women; 3) Use of Interpreters with CALD populations in a Secondary Health Service and impacts on Health Outcomes. Having undertaken research in sexual and reproductive health, Jaya will contribute a social, cultural and social determinant dimension to the advisory group.

Email: suzanne.willey@monash.edu

Research interests: refugee health; midwifery; maternal and child health; qualitative methods; evaluation

Suzanne is a senior lecturer at the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Monash University.  She joined Monash University Nursing and Midwifery in 2011 to develop and coordinate Refugee Health and Wellbeing education within the Master of Advanced Nursing.  Suzanne also teaches undergraduate midwifery studies. She has an extensive clinical background as a Midwife, Maternal and Child Health Nurse and Refugee Health Nurse in Primary Health Care.

Suzanne recently completed her PhD studies at the Monash Centre for Health Research and Implementation (MCHRI), Monash University. Her research evaluated the implementation of a perinatal mental health screening program for women of refugee background from both the women’s and health professionals’ perspective and through extensive health record audit. This evaluation led to a commitment by the health service to implement the program across the broader maternity service. Suzanne remains actively involved in research, and is currently co-leading an evaluation of the Victorian statewide Refugee Health Program.

Camille is a perinatal epidemiologist, at The Sydney School of Public Health, University of Sydney.  Her research aims to reduce the burden of perinatal morbidity and mortality and improve the health of women and babies particularly of those most vulnerable.   Camille was part of the research team that first identified the risk of maternal supine sleeping for stillbirth in Australia.  The project funded through the CRE that Camille is working on, is aiming to improve health literacy around reducing stillbirth risk for women not born in Australia.  Camille is also leading a large cluster randomised controlled trial in Bangladesh of an intervention to reduce household air pollution to assess the effect on pregnancy outcomes, particularly stillbirth and neonatal mortality.  Camille is Director of the Masters of Global Health program, and co-leads the Global Health and Nutrition Research Collaboration in the Sydney School of Public Health at The University of Sydney.