Research Staff
Associate Professor Rebecca Ivers - Director, Injury Division
Areas of special interest:
- Research to policy interface
- Capacity building
- Indigenous injury
Associate Professor Rebecca Ivers is the Director of the Injury Division at The George Institute for International Health. She is an injury epidemiologist who holds a Masters degree in Public Health and PhD in injury epidemiology from the University of Sydney. She has published widely in the peer reviewed literature in the fields of road traffic injury and falls prevention.
Rebecca has research interests that span a broad range of topics, including novice drivers, motorcycle helmets in Asia and heavy vehicle research. She is passionate about the need to decrease road injury in vulnerable road users in the low and middle income countries of the region and is actively engaged in research with this aim. She is particularly interested in injury prevention among Indigenous communities. Rebecca has written several book chapters on road injury for international audiences, including manuals for the World Health Organization. She leads a strong team of researchers working on road injury studies in Australia, India, China and Vietnam.
[list of journal articles on PubMed]
Associate Professor Ivers can be contacted via email: rivers@george.org.au
Professor Robyn Norton - Principal Director
Areas of special interest:
- International road safety and injury issues
- Australia's position versus the international situation
- Road safety issues in low-income countries
Professor Robyn Norton is Principal Director of The George Institute for International Health, Professor of Public Health within the School of Public Health and Associate Dean (International) within the Faculties of Health at the University of Sydney. In addition, she holds the positions of Honorary Professor at Peking University Health Science Center in Beijing, China and Honorary Consultant Epidemiologist at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney. Robyn was previously responsible for the management of The George Institute’s Injury Prevention and Trauma Care Division and was the Foundation Director of the Injury Prevention Research Centre at the University of Auckland, New Zealand.
Professor Norton is Chair of the Road Traffic Injuries Research Network, a global partnership for the promotion, conduct and utilisation of research for the prevention and control of road traffic injuries in low and middle-income countries, and Chair of the Australian Coalition for Global Health Research. In addition, she regularly consults with the World Health Organization’s Department of Violence and Injury Prevention.
Professor Norton is widely published in the area of road safety, and has a national and international profile in this area. Robyn was a member of the WHO Pre-hospital Care Steering Committee, overseeing a series of Cochrane reviews of the effectiveness of pre-hospital trauma care. She was also co-author of the WHO’s 5-year strategy for road traffic injury prevention and the lead author of a chapter on the epidemiology of road traffic injuries, for the WHO’s World Report on Road Traffic Injuries. Additionally, Professor Norton co-authored a chapter on unintentional injuries in the developing world for a World Bank, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the US National Institutes of Health sponsored project - the Disease Control Priorities in Developing Countries. She was also the lead author for a chapter on injuries and violence for the 2nd edition of a major text entitled, International Public Health.
[list of journal articles on PubMed]
Professor Norton can be contacted via email: rnorton@george.org.au
Professor Mark Stevenson - Senior Director
Areas of special interest:
- National and International road safety issues
- Young drivers and the role of the graduated licensing system
- Driver distraction and the risk of car crash
- Pre-hospital trauma care
Professor Mark Stevenson is a Senior Director at The George Institute for International Health and Professor in the School of Public Health at the University of Sydney and a National Health and Medical Research Council (Australia) Fellow. Prior to these appointments, Professor Stevenson was an Associate Professor in the School of Population Health at the University of Western Australia.
Professor Stevenson has also worked as an Associate Professor in the Department of Epidemiology & Biostatistics at Curtin University, Perth, Australia, as an epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, USA and at the Harvard University School of Public Health. He has extensive public health experience in low and middle-income countries including as a consultant for WHO, UNICEF and the Swedish International Development Agency.
Professor Stevenson is a strong advocate for road and child injury prevention and has worked on numerous national and international projects related to these areas. Professor Stevenson has extensive research experience including investigations of mobile phone use and motor vehicle crash, young drivers and motor vehicle crash, childhood pedestrian injuries and alcohol-related road traffic injury, as well as studies involving paediatric fire and burn-related injuries.
Professor Stevenson is a member of the Australasian Trauma Society, the Australasian College of Road Safety, a member of the editorial boards for a number of international journals, and is a member of the Technical Advisory Group for the international not-for-profit, The Alliance for Safe Children.
[list of journal articles on PubMed]
Professor Stevenson can be contacted via email: mstevenson@george.org.au
Associate Professor Rakhi Dandona - Senior Research Fellow
Areas of special interest:
- Impact of injuries in low-income countries
- Response of health system to deal with injuries in low-income countries
- Evidence-based policies for injury prevention
- Capacity-building for injury research in low-income countries
Rakhi Dandona is a Senior Research Fellow with the Injury Division at The George Institute for International Health and Associate Professor with the School of Public Health at the University of Sydney. In addition, she is the Head of the Population Health Research Division at The George Institute for International Health - India. She received her PhD from The University of Melbourne. Rakhi has been involved with population-based research in injuries and a variety of diseases as well as operations research and evaluation of health system. She has published widely in the peer-reviewed literature including the Lancet, WHO Bulletin and BMC Medicine.
She is currently involved with a large population-based assessment of injuries in rural India, risk factors assessment for road traffic injuries heavy vehicle drivers in India, and is developing injury and trauma research programs with a focus on the South Asia region. Previously, Rakhi has held a grant from the Wellcome Trust, UK for a comprehensive assessment study of road traffic injuries in an urban setting in India, which is likely to make a significant contribution towards addressing the knowledge gaps in road traffic injuries in less developed settings for developing effective interventions. Prior to this study, she has conducted behavioral and social research on road traffic injuries in vulnerable groups such as pedestrians and two-wheeler users, and commercial vehicle drivers. She has also undertaken road safety policy and road safety intervention research.
[list of journal articles on PubMed]
Associate Professor Dandona can be contacted via email: rdandona@george.org.au
Dr Teresa Senserrick - Senior Research Fellow
Areas of special interest:
- Novice drivers, particularly young drivers and their peer passengers
- National and international road safety research and policy development
- Developmental issues pertaining to road safety
- Understanding motivation and risk taking
Dr Teresa Senserrick is a Senior Research Fellow in the Injury Division at The George Institute. Her training is in developmental psychology and she has worked in health and injury research fields for almost two decades based in Australia, the United States and Sweden.
Teresa has specialised in research on young and novice drivers and their passengers, including international reviews of best practice, particularly in driver education, training and graduated licensing. She has been sought out as a guest speaker and reviewer, including for the National Institutes of Health in the US, and several high-impact, peer-reviewed journals. Current projects include the DRIVE study and a review of novice driver education, training and licensing in China.
[list of journal articles on PubMed]
Dr Senserrick can be contacted via email: tsenserrick@george.org.au.
"I really enjoy working with young people and letting their views be heard. Seeing sound research converted into policy is a highlight. However, too often the benefits don’t reach our local remote and disadvantaged communities or our neighbouring low and middle income countries. This is where my current interests lie."
Dr Soufiane Boufous - Senior Research Fellow
Areas of special interest:
- Record linkage of injury-related data
- Falls prevention in older people
- Road safety Research
- Sports-related injury
- Work-related injury
Dr Soufiane Boufous is a Senior Research Fellow in the Injury Division at The George Institute and a conjoint Senior lecturer in the School of Public Health at the University of Sydney. He is an injury epidemiologist with a Masters degree in Public Health, University of Sydney and a PhD in epidemiology, University of NSW Wales. Soufiane’s previous research experience focused on investigating data quality and methodological issues related to the coding, analysis and reporting injury data as well as record linkage of various injury related databases including the linkage of police crash data to the hospital data to improve understanding of the circumstances and outcomes of traffic crashes. Soufiane has also been involved in investigating the burden of falls- related injury in older people as well as the impact of work-related and sports-related injury. He is currently working on the Young Driver Cohort Study - DRIVE study.
[list of journal articles on PubMed]
Dr Boufous can be contacted via email: sboufous@george.org.au
"A few years ago while reading through various "glossy" epidemiological reports on injury, I was surprised to discover the number of limitations of existing datasets used to measure the burden of injury in the population. Since then I developed a passion for investigating ways of improving the quality of administrative databases related to injury and the potential of linking these datasets to provide a comprehensive picture on the circumstances and outcomes of injury. Access to good quality data is vital to understanding injury risk factors and to inform the development, implementation and evaluation of health policies and programs in this area"
Dr Alexandra Martiniuk - Senior Research Fellow
Areas of special interest:
- Mental health as related to chronic disease (epilepsy, cancer) and injury
- Child and youth health
- Asia Pacific region
- Cluster randomized trial and cohort design methods
Dr Alexandra Martiniuk is a Senior Research Fellow in the Injury and Mental Health Divisions at The George Institute. She trained in Canada as an epidemiologist and has been in Australia for 4 years as Senior Research Fellow and Lecturer in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Sydney. Dr Martiniuk is currently a fellow of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. Her primary research interests are in the psychosocial aspects of chronic disease (epilepsy, cancer) and injury in the Asia Pacific region. Dr Martiniuk was previously the manager of the Asia Pacific Cohort Studies Collaboration. Her past research includes work into the burden of HIV/AIDS in Belize, epilepsy in Canada, and chronic diseases (cancer, cardiovascular disease) in Canada and the Asia Pacific region.
Past and current projects include work in and/or with colleagues from Asia (China, Japan, Thailand, Singapore, South Korea), Belize, Canada, Honduras, the Middle East, New Zealand and the Solomon Islands. Dr Martiniuk currently facilitates problem-based learning sessions in the medical sciences program and is also a moderator for the online Injury Epidemiology, Prevention and Control course (see Education).
Dr Martiniuk’s current projects include research on DRIVE (a study of vehicle crashes in youth), SEISMIC (a study of the burden of epilepsy) and the Fletcher Challenge and New Zealand Blood Donors Cohort Studies. As well as continued work with the Solomon Islands, Canadian Epilepsy Alliance and Trillium Childhood Cancer Support Centre.
[list of journal articles on PubMed]
Dr Martiniuk can be contacted via email: amartiniuk@george.org.au
"Mental and psychosocial disorders are common to all countries and cause immense suffering and staggering economic costs. People with poor mental health are often subjected to social isolation, poor quality of life and increased mortality. Poor mental health affects, and is affected by, chronic disease. Mental health, according to the WHO, does not get the priority it deserves in terms of policies, research and care given its prevalence and impact. My interests lie in addressing stigma, understanding and then reducing the burden of mental disorders as related to chronic disease and injury."
Dr James Yu - Senior Research Fellow (China)
Areas of special interest:
- Road traffic injury prevention in China
- China Seatbelt Intervention project
- Motorcycle Helmet Intervention project
Dr James Yu is a Senior Research Fellow in the Injury Division of The George Institute, based in the China office. He has previously been a public health doctor of Nanchang Centre for Disease Control, China. His past research includes the China Seatbelt Intervention, the first large-scale road traffic injury prevention program developed in China, under the collaboration of Chinese government sectors, health research institution and industry. Other research recently undertaken includes a multi-center study "Facilitating Reductions in Non-Standard Motorcycle Helmet Use", a review of novice driver education, training and licensing in China and the China Trauma Study.
Dr Yu can be contacted via email: jyu@george.org.au
Dr Jane Elkington - Senior Project Manager
Dr Jane Elkington is a Senior Project Manager in the Injury Divisions, The George Institute, managing the Heavy Vehicle Study. Jane has extensive experience in injury surveillance and prevention including over 10 years as Director, Jane Elkington & Associates and six years as Statewide Manager, Injury Prevention, NSW Health.
Jane has been appointed to three national and state ministerial advisory councils, including the Australian Advisory Committee for Road Trauma (1995-1998) and the NSW Road SafetyTask Force (2001-08) and currently sits on the Board of Directors of YouthSafe, an NGO devoted to the prevention of serious injuries to young people.
Jane has authored and co-authored many reports and guidelines currently in use by a range of government departments including:
- ‘The Community Services Safety Pack: A guide to occupational health & safety’ for the community services sector (WorkCover NSW)
- ‘Managing Loss and Grief in the Aged Care Industry’ (WorkCover NSW)
- Management Policy to Reduce Fall Injury Among Older People (NSW Health)
- Jane authored the chapter on Injury Prevention in the widely used book "Hands on Health Promotion" (Ed.s R Moodie, A. Hulme, 2006).
- Dr Elkington can be contacted via email: jelkington@george.org.au
"I can’t say that I lean towards one area of injury prevention more than others. Since my first lecture in a course on Injury Prevention at the University of Minnesota, I have been ‘taken’ by the realisation that understanding injuries is the essential first step to preventing them."
Dr Elkington can be contacted via email: jelkington@george.org.au
Dr Yousef Al-Hosani - Research Scholar
Areas of special interest:
- Health economics and comparative health care systems
- Motor vehicle injuries in the United Arab Emirates (UAE)
- Health promotion
Dr Al-Hosani is a Research Fellow in the Injury Division at The George Institute. Dr Al-Hosani is a graduate of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, and holds a Master of Public Health from University College, Dublin. He has previously worked as the Head of Preventive Medicine, Infectious Disease and Immunisation Department for the UAE Armed Forces-Medical Services. Dr Al-Hosani is currently completing a Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) on motor vehicle injury in the United Arab Emirates, focusing on seatbelt interventions in Abu Dhabi, the capital of UAE.
Dr Al-Hosani can be contacted via email: zmhdoctor@yahoo.com
Marilyn Lyford - Research Fellow
Areas of special interest:
- Child and youth injury prevention among urban Aboriginal populations
- Promoting safety in Indigenous communities through community based interventions
- Indigenous Workforce Development
Marilyn is a Research Fellow in the Injury Division at The George Institute. She has a Bachelor of Health Science (Health Promotion) and has been working in the area of injury prevention for the past ten years.
Her focus is working with Indigenous communities in urban, rural and remote areas to increase capacity and promote safety through community based and workforce development strategies.
She is currently working on an NHMRC funded study, Safe Koori Kids: Community Based Approaches, entailing the development, implementation and evaluation of community based interventions to promote child and youth safety. Marilyn is also coordinating the partnership project Safety Promotion and Injury Prevention Program for Rural and Remote Aboriginal Health and Community Workers.
Marilyn Lyford can be contacted via email: mlyford@george.org.au
"I am passionate about working collaboratively and in partnership with community organisations to build Aboriginal safety promotion and injury prevention capacity at the local level. Visiting communities provides real insight into the challenges faced in addressing local injury and safety issues. Implementing workforce development and capacity building programs can empower communities to tackle these issues an effect positive change."
Dang Viet Hung - Research Scholar
Areas of special interest:
- Motorcycle injury and helmet use in Vietnam and low and middle income countries
- Burden of road traffic injuries
- Policy applications to reducing road injuries in low and middle income countries
Dr Hung, a former Fulbright scholar, is a Research fellow in the Injury Division at The George Institute and an employee of the Department of Therapy of the Ministry of Health of Vietnam. He is currently spending four years with The George Institute as an AUSAID scholar studying for a Doctor of Philosophy degree at the University of Sydney. His research currently being undertaken in Hai Duong Province, Vietnam, will have significant policy implications related to motorcycle helmet use in Vietnam.
Dr Hung can be contacted via email: hdangviet@george.org.au or vdan8956@mail.usyd.edu.au.
Reece Hinchcliff - Research Scholar
Areas of special interest:
- Road safety policy development
- Knowledge translation
- Road safety issues affecting young drivers
Reece is a Research Scholar in the Injury Division at The George Institute for International Health and a Tutor in The Masters in Public Health program at The University of Sydney. As part of his PhD thesis entitled ‘Policy Pathways’, Reece is currently researching the factors involved in the development of road safety policy throughout Australia.
Having completed his honors year in social anthropology at The University of Sydney in 2005, in early 2006 he was awarded a PhD scholarship by the NRMA-ACT Road Safety Trust to contribute to the minimisation of Australian road traffic injury.
Reece Hinchcliff can be contacted via email: rhinchcliff@george.org.au
"I have a passion for researching the multiple factors which combine to produce road safety policies in Australia and around the world. It is critical that these policymaking processes are made transparent so as to foster greater government accountability. Of particular interest is the way that research is utilised, as the maximum benefits from public investment in road safety research is infrequently realised. As a global community we must ensure that everything possible is being done to reduce the financial and emotional burden of road safety injury being increasingly felt around the world."
Tom Chen — Research Scholar
Area of special interest:
- Analysis of data from cohort studies in injury
- Risk factors for road traffic injury
- Cost of treatment of road traffic injuries
Tom is a Research Scholar in the Injury Division at The George Institute, who is researching differences in motor vehicle injuries between rural and urban areas. By investigating the DRIVE study, a prospective cohort of 20,822 young drivers in NSW of Australia, risk factors as well as medical utilisation for motor vehicle injuries will be examined. Through this research, he expects to further contribute to knowledge relating to analysis of cohort study data in injuries.
Tom Chen can be contacted via email: tchen@george.org.au
Liz de Rome - Research Scholar
Areas of special interest:
- Motorcycle safety
- Motorcycle protective clothing
- Strategic planning for road safety
- Young driver and rider education
Liz de Rome is a Research Scholar in the Injury Division at The George Institute. Liz is a psychologist with over 15 years experience as the managing director of her own independent road safety research company. She has specialized in identifying specific road safety issues and then facilitating consultations between community representatives, government agencies and road safety experts to identify and agree on strategies for change. She also manages the IPWEA Road Safety Speakers Bureau, as a service to provide road safety expertise to local government road authorities. Liz is an Associate Fellow of the Australasian College of Road Safety and Chair of the NSW Division.
Liz is currently conducting research on the usage and benefits of motorcycle protective clothing. Since 2000, she has focused on strategic approaches to motorcycle safety and is the primary author of Positioned for Safety (Editions 1 & 2), the motorcycle safety strategic plan for the Motorcycle Council of NSW. She is also the author of a number of conference papers, publications and websites aimed at providing reliable information to riders about motorcycle safety issues.
Liz is funded by a PhD scholarship from the NRMA-ACT Road Safety Trust.
Liz de Rome can be contacted via email: lderome@george.org.au.
Lisa Sharwood - Research Scholar
Areas of special interest:
- Risk factors for crash involvement in heavy vehicle drivers
- Influence of co-morbidities and obesity on crash risk
- Child injury risk and prevention strategies
- Research governance/GCP
Lisa Sharwood is a Research Scholar in the Injury Division at The George Institute, conducting research on the risk of crash involvement as a heavy vehicle driver. Lisa is a critical care nurse by background, with extensive experience both in Australia and overseas. She has a Masters degree in Public Health, with a focus on clinical epidemiology/biostatistics. She has formerly worked as a Research Fellow at the Monash University Accident Research Centre, on road safety projects such as ANCIS (Australian National Crash In-depth Study) and ECI (Enhanced Crash Investigation study). Her most recent position was Research Coordinator for the Emergency Department at the Royal Children’s Hospital/Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne, where she retains an Honorary Research Fellowship. Lisa is funded by a PhD scholarship from an ARC linkage grant.
Lisa Sharwood can be contacted via email: lsharwood@george.org.au
Jagnoor Jagnoor - Research Scholar
Areas of special interest:
- Epidemiology of injuries in India
- Verbal autopsy as a tool for measuring injury related deaths in LMIC
- Validation and Injury surveillance research
Jagnoor is a Research Scholar in the Injury Division at The George Institute. She is currently researching the epidemiology of injuries in India. Her research work in India is funded by Endeavour Research Fellowship. She also aims to establish the validity of verbal autopsy method in determining deaths due to injury. Through her work she aims to access injury mortality burden in India and improve injury surveillance system in the developing world.
Jagnoor can be contacted via email: jjagnoor@george.org.au
"Belonging to a family of social scientist and public health specialists, I had the opportunity to understand the need of public health by accompanying them on their field visits for vaccination, sanitation, and adult literacy. These visits made me realize how inequitable the society and access to the resources was. During my training as a dental surgeon, there was an outbreak of plague in my city. The loss of lives was minimized because the epidemiologists worked together to control the epidemic which had the potential to claim several lives. The episode deepened my interest in public health and I decided to peruse my career as public health researcher. I completed Masters of Public Health to equip myself with the necessary theory, principles, and practices of public health. During the course, I gained insight into the global disease burden and into how the health burden in developing countries is undergoing transition from infectious disease to chronic conditions and injuries. Though the burden of injuries is projected to increase over the next decade, it is still not a public health priority in many developing countries. I have chosen injuries as my area of interest to contribute towards evidence - based injury prevention and interventions in such settings."
Katrina Lane - Support Staff
Katrina is the Personal Assistant to Associate Professor Rebecca Ivers and provides administrative and research support to the Injury Division.
Katrina can be contacted via email on klane@george.org.au.