Speakers

Speakers

Keynote Speakers

 

A/Professor Jane Burns

Associate Professor Jane Burns is the founder and CEO of the Young and Well Cooperative Research Centre, an organisation that unites young people with researchers, practitioners and innovators to explore the role of technology in improving mental health and wellbeing for young people aged 12 to 25.

Jane holds a Principal Research Fellowship at Orygen, The National Centre of Excellence in Youth Mental Health and an Honorary Fellowship at the Brain & Mind Research Institute. She has led the youth agenda for beyondblue, was a Commonwealth Fund Harkness Fellow at the University of California, San Francisco, and was Director of International Partnerships at Inspire Foundation. Jane held a VicHealth fellowship from 2006-2013, an NHMRC fellowship from 1997-2000 and an NHMRC scholarship from 1994-1996. She holds a PhD in Medicine from the Faculty of Medicine (Public Health and Epidemiology) University of Adelaide.

Jane has just been announced a winner in the category of Innovation for 2015’s Australian Financial Review and Westpac Group 100 Women of Influence and was a Victorian Finalist in the 2012 Telstra Business Women’s Awards. Jane is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

 

A/Professor Sam Winter

Sam Winter works in sexology at the School of Public Health at the Faculty of Health Science at Curtin University in Perth. His interests include sexual and gender development and diversity, rights, health and education. A psychologist by training and professional experience, Sam has taught, researched and published extensively in trans health and rights. He has also worked extensively as a psychologist with trans clients. He has worked with WHO (being one of those responsible for proposals for ICD-11 diagnostic reform), and with UNDP (authoring their 2012 Lost in Transition report). Since 2009 he has been a board member of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH). He was one of the authors of their most recent Standards of Care (SOC-7). He has done advocacy work  regionally and worldwide, working with Asia-Pacific Transgender Network (APTN) and Global Action for Trans* Equality (GATE).

Invited Speakers

 

Dr Donna Cross

Dr Donna Cross is a Winthrop Professor with the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences at the University of Western Australia and the Telethon Kids Institute. Donna has been awarded over $17m in competitive grants addressing child and adolescent health promotion which has supported 42 applied school and community-based research intervention projects investigating ways to enhance the social and emotional development and reduce bullying (including cyberbullying) and other anti-social behaviour among children and adolescents. She currently leads seven 3-5 year research projects that aim to enhance student wellbeing, especially their social competence, and other skills to reduce all forms of anti-social behaviour and mental health harms among school-age children and adolescents. In 2012, Donna received the award for Western Australian, ‘Australian of the Year’ for her services to children’s health.

Panel Speakers

 

Jane Martin

Jane Martin, BA (Hons), MPH, is Executive Manager of the Obesity Policy Coalition (OPC) and of Alcohol and Obesity Policy at the Cancer Council Victoria. She is a Senior Fellow at Melbourne University and an Honorary Fellow at Deakin University.

In her role at the OPC, Jane advocates for policy and regulatory reform to prevent overweight and obesity, with a focus on food marketing, labelling, and tax and pricing measures. Jane has worked extensively in public health advocacy, first in tobacco control then in obesity prevention and more recently alcohol control. Her interests lie in advocacy, partnerships, policy oriented research and using evidence-informed arguments for policy reform.

She has published a number of book chapters, papers, contributes to research grants and is active in the media and with other related advocacy initiatives. She is a member of international and national advisory committees, Vice-President of the Australia New Zealand Obesity Society, a Churchill Fellow and is a board member of Family Planning Victoria.

 

Professor George Patton

George Patton is Professorial Fellow in Adolescent Health Research at the University of Melbourne and NH&MRC Senior Principal Research Fellow. He has a clinical background in child and adolescent psychiatry and later trained in epidemiology. He has both domestic and global focus in his research. In Australia, he has led a series of long term longitudinal studies dealing with the emergence of health risks in adolescence, and their consequences in later life and for the next generation. He has also been engaged in large scale prevention trials in community and schools settings, as well as trials of health interventions in primary care. Globally he has played a lead role in the first studies of death, burden of disease and health risks in adolescents. He has led two series in adolescent health for the Lancet and is currently the Chair of a Lancet Commission in Adolescent Health and Well-being. He has had advisory roles with the UN, World Health Organization, the World Bank and UNICEF.

Workshop Presenters

 

Julie Clark

Julie has worked in education for the past 25 years, as a secondary science teacher and more recently, an Associate Principal for the School of Special Educational Needs: Medical and Mental Health (SSEN:MMH). Julie has worked in a variety of educational settings including both primary and secondary schools, rural and metropolitan locations, Training WA sites and the hospital school at Princess Margaret Hospital (known as SSEN:MMH). Her work at SSEN:MMH involves the management of various teaching and liaison programs across multiple Health sites throughout Western Australia, which provide educational support for students whose capacity to engage with their usual school program is impacted by their health condition.

 

Dr Daniel Le Grange

Daniel Le Grange, PhD, is Benioff UCSF Professor in Children’s Health in the Departments of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), and Joint Director of the Eating Disorders Program in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (Psychiatry) and Division of Adolescent Medicine (Pediatrics). Dr. Le Grange also is Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioural Neuroscience at The University of Chicago. He received his doctoral education at the Maudsley Hospital and Institute of Psychiatry, the University of London, and completed postdoctoral training at the University of London and at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Dr. Le Grange’s research interests focuses primarily on the treatment of adolescents with eating disorders. He has authored or co-authored more than 400 manuscripts, books, book chapters, and abstracts, as well as more than 190 presentations for US and international scientific meetings. Dr. Le Grange is a Fellow of the Academy for Eating Disorders, a Member of the Eating Disorders Research Society, Associate Editor for the Journal of Eating Disorders and BMC Psychiatry, and serves on the Editorial Boards of the European Eating Disorders Review and the International Journal of Eating Disorders. He has lectured extensively across North America, Europe, Australia, Asia, and South Africa. Over the past 15 years, Dr. Le Grange’s research has been supported by the National Institutes of Health (US), as well as the National Health and Medical Research Council (Australia). He is currently Principal Investigator on several US-funded treatment studies, and a Principal Investigator on a 6‐year treatment study funded by the Baker Foundation in the Department of Paediatrics at the University of Melbourne, Australia. Dr Le Grange is the 2013‐2014 recipient of the Presidential Chair Award at UCSF, and the 2014 recipient of the Diploma of Leadership & Management in Research Award.

 

Associate Professor Donald Payne

Donald Payne is Associate Professor in Adolescent Medicine at the University of Western Australia and a Consultant Adolescent Physician at Princess Margaret Hospital, Perth, WA. A major focus of his clinical work involves the management of young people with complex, chronic illness and associated school non-attendance, in collaboration with the WA School of Special Educational Needs. Most recently he has established a research collaboration with colleagues across a range of disciplines to investigate the educational experience and outcomes for young people with chronic illness.

 

Kevin Runions

Kevin Runions (BSc Hon; B.Ed; MA; PhD) is a Senior Research Fellow with the Telethon Kids Institute, and an adjunct with the University of Western Australia. Kevin was awarded a PhD in Human Development and Education from the University of Toronto in 2004. He is also an adjunct assistant professor with the University of Victoria, British Columbia, and adjunct lecturer at Edith Cowan University.

A passionate proponent of biopsychosocial models of health, Kevin’s research addresses the role of social contexts, including schools and cyber-technologies, in social-cognitive processes in the perpetration of aggression and bullying, and in the health impact of victimization and discrimination experiences.

Kevin is currently directing the Beyond Bullying project, a school-based trial of the efficacy of motivational interviewing in working with youth who bully. He has also been active in a new Telethon Kids Institute working group examining the impact of chronic health conditions on school experiences and mental health.

 

Dr Michelle Telfer

Dr Michelle Telfer is an Adolescent Physician and the Clinical Lead Adolescent Medicine at The Centre for Adolescent Health, The Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne. Michelle is the lead clinician for the RCH Gender Service and has been instrumental in developing the multidisciplinary gender service in the context of an exponential increase in referrals over the past 3 years. Michelle is a strong advocate for improvement in medical and mental health service provision for transgender children and adolescents as well as advocating for change in the legal situation in Australia which currently necessitates court approval for hormone treatment of adolescents. Prior to studying medicine at UWA Michelle was a gymnast with the Western Australian Institute of Sport, winning a silver and bronze medal at the 1990 Commonwealth Games and was a team member of the 1992 Olympic Gymnastics Team in Barcelona.

More information on other presenters to come soon.