Investigators and AMOSS team
Investigators:
Associate Professor Elizabeth Sullivan
Elizabeth Sullivan is a perinatal epidemiologist and public health physician at the Perinatal and Reproductive Epidemiology Research Unit, School of Women’s and Children’s Health, University of New South Wales. She is a highly respected perinatal epidemiologist and has been Director of the AIHW National Perinatal Statistics Unit since 2001. She is member of a number of national and international advisory committees on perinatal and reproductive health. Her major research interests are in reproductive and maternal morbidity and mortality and the development of perinatal surveillance systems.
Professor David Ellwood
David Ellwood is Professor of Obstetrics & Gynaecology and Deputy Dean of the Australian National University Medical School. He is also President of Women's Hospitals Australasia, an organisation which has a major interest in safety and quality of maternity services. He is a sub-specialist in maternal–fetal medicine at The Canberra Hospital and has a major clinical interest in managing high-risk pregnancy and dealing with perinatal death. He is also the current Chair of the Australian & New Zealand Stillbirth Alliance.
Professor Michael John Peek
Michael Peek is the Professor of Obstetrics & Gynaecology at the University of Sydney. He is a sub-specialist in maternal–fetal medicine at Nepean Hospital and has over 20 years experience in high-risk obstetrics with a particular interest in maternal medicine. He is a member and previous holder of various council positions in a number of national and international maternal and perinatal societies. He brings experience in the classification and audit of maternal medical disorders and the administration and coordination of high-risk obstetric services.
Professor Caroline Homer
Caroline Homer is the Professor of Midwifery and the Director of the Centre for Midwifery, Child and Family Health at University of Technology, Sydney. She is the immediate past President of the NSW Midwives Association. She provides midwifery care to women as part of a small caseload practice through the St George Hospital in Sydney. Her interests include developing systems to improve continuity of care for women, monitoring quality and safety of maternity care and developing competency standards for maternity care services.
Professor Lisa Jackson-Pulver
Lisa Rae Jackson-Pulver is the inaugural chair in Indigenous Health at the University of New South Wales and Director of the Muru Marri Indigenous Health Unit. Lisa is a modern, Wiradjuri woman whose traditional roots lie in a beautiful, forested region of south western NSW. Dr Jackson-Pulver’s background has made her acutely aware of the lack of available data to identify underlying issues in the health for Aboriginal people who today, usually reside in the large metropolitan and urban centres of Australia. She is member of a number of national advisory groups including: the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health and Research Advisory Committee of the NHMRC; Advisory Group on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Statistics, Australian Bureau of Statistics; and Leaders in Indigenous Medical Education working group of the Medical Deans Australia and New Zealand. She is currently the Deputy Chairperson and one of three Indigenous advisors for AHMAC’s National Advisory Group Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Health Information and Data.
Dr Marian Knight
Marian Knight is a Senior Clinical Research Fellow and Honorary Consultant in Public Health at the National Perinatal Epidemiology Unit, University of Oxford. She is a highly respected perinatal epidemiologist who developed the United Kingdom Obstetric Surveillance System (UKOSS) to study ‘near-miss’ maternal morbidity and other rare disorders of pregnancy, leading the initiative since its inception. This system is the prototype for AMOSS. She has conducted 9 national studies on a range of uncommon pregnancy disorders in the United Kingdom over the last 4 years.
Associate Investigators:
Professor Elizabeth Elliott
Dr Yvonne Zurynski
Yvonne Zurynski is Deputy Director of the APSU and Senior Lecturer, Discipline of Paediatrics and Child Health, The University of Sydney. Yvonne has a special interest in rare diseases research, especially rare injuries. She has led a number of surveillance studies, has supported the development of new surveillance systems and has been instrumental in developing strategic national and international collaborations. She has attracted numerous grants, and has published widely.
Dr Claire McLintock
Claire McLintock is a haematologist and obstetric physician based in Auckland, New Zealand. She is Clinical Director of Obstetric Medicine in National Women's Health, Auckland City Hospital and Chairperson of the New Zealand Maternal Mortality Working Group of the Perinatal and Maternal Mortality Review Committee and the current President of the Society of Obstetric Medicine of Australia and New Zealand (SOMANZ).
Dr Nolan McDonnell
Dr Nolan McDonnell is a staff specialist in the Department of Anaesthesia and Pain Medicine, King Edward Memorial Hospital for Women in Perth, Western Australia. He has a particular interest in the prevention of maternal morbidity and mortality and has positions on the Western Australia State Maternal Mortality Committee and the Education and Training Subcommittee of the National Maternal Mortality Committee. He is heavily involved in clinical research. He has always had an interest in rare conditions of pregnancy from his early years of training and he looks forward to actively contributing to the development and implementation of AMOSS.
Associate Professor Tessa Ho
Tessa has a longstanding interest and commitment to medical education and professional development, manifest in her work both as a medical educator and medical administrator in workforce planning. She has had extensive involvement throughout the spectrum of medical training and education: as University medical educator of undergraduate and postgraduate medical students, as UNSW representative on the Australian Medical Council Assessment Team for accreditation of new Australian medical schools, as Deputy Chair of the Education and Resource Development Committee of the NSW Postgraduate Medical Council and member of the former Medical Training and Education Council and the NSW State Committee of the Royal Australasian College of Medical Administrators. Tessa is a medical graduate of the University of Sydney who has a Doctorate of Medicine in Health Services Management with a particular interest in equitable and efficient health workforce training and support especially in relation to health care provision for those disadvantaged by rurality, gender and ethnicity.
Dr Jane Thompson
Jane Thompson is the Senior Research Officer for Women's Hospital's Australasia (WHA). WHA is a widely regarded not-for-profit peak body whose mission is to support women’s hospitals and health services to achieve excellence in clinical care. Membership of WHA comprises the leading women's hospitals and health services located throughout Australia and New Zealand. Jane’s research interests are in mothers' health after childbirth. She has been involved in research projects on mothers' experiences of neonatal intensive care, epidemiology of postnatal depression and of women’s postpartum health, most recently in a multicentre cohort study of women experiencing severe postpartum haemorrhage. She also has experience in clinical practice improvement, primarily in obstetrics. She is a long term and active member of the Perinatal Society of Australia and New Zealand.
Dr Wendy Pollock
Dr Wendy Pollock is a critical care nurse and midwife who examined the characteristics, severity of illness and provision of acute health services to critically ill pregnant and postnatal women for her PhD thesis. She sits on the Victorian Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Committee and on the National Advisory Committee on Maternal Mortality. In her role as clinical coordinator (Victoria & Tasmania), Dr Pollock liaised with hospitals and developed data tools for the AMOSS system.
Project team:
Geri Vaughan
Geri's background as a Registered Nurse included a special interest in women's health. Her subsequent career path - initially within the tertiary sector, followed by a successful consultancy - had a strong project management emphasis in coordinating information resources, and IT development/training. More recently, she has moved to bring her IT/management skills back into the health arena. As project coordinator, Geri administers the AMOSS project, including research protocol development, ethical approval process, liaising with hospitals and working with all stakeholders. She is currently completing her Master of Public Health at UNSW.