Congratulations recipients of Churchill Fellowship Prof Angela Morgan and Dr Selina Parry
Congratulations Prof Angela Morgan, Department of Speech Pathology, and Dr Selina Parry, Department of Physiotherapy, for receiving a Winston Churchill Trust 2020 Churchill Fellowship.
Churchill Fellowships seek to create national and international improvements by providing people with the opportunity to connect and collaborate with leaders of influence around the world. Through international collaboration, Prof Angela Morgan and Dr Selina Parry aim to apply the knowledge and experience they will gain to improve health care and education systems in Australia.
Prof Angela Morgan will be seeking out knowledge and experience from contacts located in the Netherlands and the UK. Her project aims to apply effective international clinical trial practices in speech pathology to the Australian context, to improve the research evidence base for speech therapies, and educate future speech pathologists in trials methods.
Prof Morgan will focus on developing more targeted therapies and treatments for children with severe speech disorders. She intends to use the Churchill Fellowship to connect with Professor Ben Maassen in Groningen, Netherlands, who has developed a digital speech outcome measure for Dutch children. In the UK, Prof Morgan seeks to learn from Professor Pam Enderby, Head of the International Association of Logopedics and Phoniatrics, a group affiliated with the World Health Organisation, to gain insight about involving children from more vulnerable populations in clinical trials. Prof Morgan also seeks to gain knowledge from Professor James Law, who is also located in the UK and an expert in government and policy regarding child speech and language services.
Dr Selina Parry will use this fellowship to connect with researchers from the US, Canada, Netherlands and the UK. She aims to use the acquired knowledge to implement a rehabilitation pathway for Australians who have survived an intensive care (ICU) admission.
Dr Parry is currently leading a multi-centre study examining the long-term outcomes post ICU admission with a focus on physical activity, balance, gait, mood, and cognitive recovery. Her active research program is directed towards the rehabilitation and recovery of individuals post-critical illness and major surgery, as well as, the use of muscle ultrasound to diagnose and detect treatment efficacy. Through the Churchill Fellowship, Dr Parry aims to support her project through the examination and exposure to successful ICU rehabilitation pathways in international settings and apply them to Australian practices.
The Churchill Fellowship intends to provide specialists with new learnings from international settings to build on the knowledge of established networks and encourage world-wide collaboration. Speaking of the Fellowship, Prof Morgan states: “I am drawn to the Churchill Foundation because of their philosophy of ongoing learning. I really value the philanthropic nature of the Churchill Fellowship and the learning opportunity it provides to people from all walks of life.”
We look forward to hearing more about these exciting opportunities and the new knowledge that Prof Morgan and Dr Parry will bring to Australia.