Speakers

We have two internal speakers (Professor Russell L. Gruen and Professor Darren Gray) and one external speaker (Dr Elizabeth Moore) in this conference. Professor Russell L. Gruen, Dean, College of Health and Medicine, Australian National University has provided consent to open the conference.Dr Elizabeth Moore, Coordinator-General Office for Mental Health and Wellbeing, ACT Health , ACT Government, will share her insight and Professor Darren Gray, Acting Director of the Research School of Population Health, will close the conference.

Internal speaker

Russell L. Gruen MBBS PhD FRACS

Russell is Dean of the College of Health and Medicine at The Australian National University. He is a specialist trauma surgeon, and has a PhD in health services research, and postdoctorate qualifications in health policy, medical ethics and business management.

He was previously Professor of Surgery and Public Health at The Alfred and Monash University, and Director of the Australian National Trauma Research Institute, after which he moved to Singapore to be founding Professor of Surgery and Vice-Dean in the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine, and Director of the Institute for Health Technologies at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

Much of Russell’s work has been at the interface of surgery and health systems, especially in resource-poor settings. His doctoral thesis examined access to specialist services for remote Aboriginal communities. He has over 20 years’ experience working with the WHO, the Indian Government, Australian Government programs and international professional societies, to solve big problems through partnerships and intersectoral collaboration, advanced technologies, and creative business models. He is a Lancet Commissioner in Global Surgery, a Fellow of the International Surgical Society, and is currently President of the Alliance for Surgery and Anaesthesia Presence, developing career paths for students and trainees interested in global surgery careers.

External speaker

Dr Elizabeth Moore (MBBS, FRANZCP)

Elizabeth Moore was born in Malaya, educated in England and Australia, completing her undergraduate medical degree at the University of Adelaide before attaining Fellowship of the RANZCP in 1990. She has special interests in codesign and governance of mental health services as well as the social and cultural determinants of health and wellbeing and their influence through a systems thinking lens.

She has worked in both public and private hospital and community settings, holding clinical and administrative positions in psychiatry in South Australia, New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia and is the inaugural ACT Coordinator-General of the Office of Mental Health and Wellbeing.

Internal speaker

Professor Darren Gray

Professor Darren Gray, an infectious disease epidemiologist, is Acting Director of the Research School of Population Health and Head of its Department of Global Health. Prof Gray has a track record in epidemiology; global health; international and tropical health; medical parasitology; water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH); neglected tropical diseases (NTDs); infectious disease transmission dynamics; health promotion/education; cluster-randomised controlled trials; and field-based epidemiological research. He currently leads a research program that investigates the transmission and control of neglected tropical diseases, some of the most prevalent and important infections that cause much suffering and economic loss worldwide. He aims to develop new public health interventions against these pathogens that will lead to their sustainable control and eventual elimination. Prof Gray is recognised internationally for his work on NTD epidemiology and control and has published in high quality journals – notably: New England Journal of Medicine, Lancet, Lancet Infectious Diseases, British Medical Journal, Clinical Microbiology Reviews, Scientific Reports, Global Change Biology, and PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases. Prof Gray has worked in global/international health since 2004 particularly Southeast Asia (China, Philippines, Indonesia, Myanmar, Vietnam, Thailand, Lao PDR, Cambodia and Timor-Leste). In 2014 he and colleagues (McManus, Williams, Bieri and Li) were finalists for the Australian Museum Eureka Prize for Infectious Disease Research.