Speaker information

I am an Associate Professor at Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia. I am currently a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Investigator Grant holder (2020-2024) conducting a project “Balance on the Brain” which is aimed at improving physical health and decreasing falls for people living with mild cognitive impairment. I have also been a Chief Investigator on over $6.8 million of external research funding from competitive sources such as the NHMRC, MRFF, Healthway, MSWA, Australian Association of Gerontology (AAG), Dementia Centre for Research Collaboration, Dementia Australia Research Foundation, Alzheimer’s WA, and the WA Department of Health. I am an ESSA Accredited Level 2 Sports Scientist and a Fellow of the AAG. Due to my expertise in exercise and physical activity for older adults, particularly those receiving home and community care or reablement, I have been invited to join research teams in Ireland and Canada, holding a Health Research Board grant (Ireland) and a Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research grant (Canada). I am the Australian Lead for the International ReAble Network (https://reable.auckland.ac.nz/) and have conducted reablement research with colleagues in Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands and New Zealand, including a seminal paper “Development of an internationally accepted definition of reablement” in Ageing and Society. I am the immediate past Western Australian Chair for the WA AAG Division (2018-2022) and have collaborated with many stakeholders in WA including community care organisations, retirement villages, hospitals, COTAWA and health organisations in both Western Australia and Australia working to improve health and reduce falls for older adults in Australia and around the world.