Dr Anne-marie Boxall

Dr Anne-marie Boxall, who is trained as a physiotherapist, has worked in the public and private sectors for more than 10 years. She holds a Master of Public Health (Hons) and PhD in health policy, and recently completed a Harkness Fellowship in Healthcare Policy and Practice in the United States.

For more than a decade, Dr Boxall has worked in high-level policy roles in the Australian Public Service and non-government organisations, most recently as a senior executive in the Department of Health.

Her role as Chief Allied Health Officer includes supporting the Australian Government’s:

• Primary Health Care 10-Year Plan
• Health workforce reforms
• Stronger Rural Health Strategy.

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Olivia Millgate BAppScOT

Olivia is a leader known for her warmth, energy and big picture thinking. She is an Occupational Therapist with 25 years’ experience in the Workplace Rehabilitation, Disability and Workplace Health Industries.

Olivia currently holds an Executive position of Capability Manager within her organisation, a wellness company providing allied health services under the multiple brands of RehabCo, Thrive Psychology and KidSkillsOT. Olivia was a pioneering leader within the company, building the Albury team from the ground up.

Olivia is passionate about aligning the development of health professionals to best practice. She takes particular care to ensure early career health professionals develop their skills within a supportive environment. Olivia is committed to making sure every person, every day is able to leave their workplace with an even greater sense of achievement and meaning through contribution to purpose.

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Prof Andrea Bialocerkowski

Professor Andrea Bialocerkowski is a registered physiotherapist and academic leader. She is currently the Director – Micro-credentialing and Professional Development in Griffith Health where she leads the development and implementation of Health-related micro-credentials. Andrea has substantial expertise in learning and teaching, which is focused on the development, implementation, and evaluation of innovative learning and teaching solutions in areas such as micro-credentials and professional development, online and interprofessional learning, and simulated and work-integrated learning, in the field of Health. Her current research focuses on university students’ work-study balance, and student placements. Andrea also retains an interest in physiotherapy, particularly in outcome measurement development and the rehabilitation of upper limb injuries, through her industry connections, such as the Australian Hand Therapy Association, and student projects.

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Prof Esther May

Professor May is the Executive Dean (Interim) UniSA Clinical and Health Sciences and Dean of Clinical Education and Equity. The role has a strategic focus on the student experience and quality of the future healthcare workforce, clinical education, equity and excellence and partnerships.

Originally trained as an occupational therapist, Esther obtained a PhD in medical sciences from the University of Gothenburg (Sweden) in 1992 and has been an active educator and researcher with achievements that include 18 PhD and Master by Research student completions. Esther has been the Australian delegate to the World Federation of Occupational Therapists and is an honorary and founding member of the Australian Hand Therapy Association.

Esther has a keen interest in health workforce matters and the role of education in producing the health workforce of the future. Esther currently oversees government funded grants targeting better rural clinical training, simulated learning and clinical supervision. Esther’s experience in management and leadership is extensive, including 7 years as Head of the School of Health Sciences and before that 7 years as Head of the School of Occupational Therapy. Esther is currently Chair of the Australian Council of Deans of Health Sciences (ACDHS).

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Presenters

Dr Elyce Green

Dr Elyce Green is a Senior Lecturer in Rural Health and the Rural Health Education Lead at Three Rivers Department of Rural Health, Charles Sturt University.

She has worked as a nurse across rural Australia for 14 years and for the past 10 years has been conducting research focused on rural health, rural workforce and work-integrated learning in rural areas. She has a passion for empowering the rural health workforce through education, mentorship, and research.

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Kathryn Fitzgerald

Kathryn is currently a Senior Lecturer at the WA Centre for Rural Health. She is a Certified Practising Speech Pathologist and educator with thirty-five years of rural and remote experience. Prior to her role at WACRH, she worked in rural health policy roles and clinical practice, including public, private and not-for-profit organisations. 

Kathryn currently works with final-year allied health students, developing new program opportunities and facilitating clinical placements to ensure that students graduate with clinical capability and resilience to work in rural and remote areas. In her role at WACRH she has recently established a new aged care nursing and allied health clinical placement program in the Gascoyne region of WA. 

Kathryn has extensive experience in health service development, including models of service delivery for rural and remote areas, quality improvement and strategic planning in health, and community consultation. She is a strong advocate for the contribution of allied health professionals in rural and remote communities and has in the past, served as the National President for Services for Australian Rural and Remote Allied Health (SARRAH). Her research interests include the impact of long rural clinical placements on rural recruitment and the development of clinical reasoning capability of allied health students during their clinical placements.

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Dr James Debenham

James is the Academic Lead of Allied Health at ‘Majarlin Kimberley Centre for Remote Health’. Majarlin is the Kimberley regions UDRH, based out of the University of Notre Dame’s Broome Campus, in northern Western Australia.

James originates from the UK and has been a clinical and academic Physiotherapist in Western Australia since 2006. He completed his PhD at Curtin University in 2017, and prior to joining Majarlin in 2022 was a Senior Lecturer in the School of Physiotherapy at the University of Notre Dame Australia’s Fremantle Campus for over a decade. Whilst James is relatively new to Majarlin, he has a long history with interest in the professional issues facing allied health practitioners; he has published work exploring issues contributing to career satisfaction within Physiotherapy in Australia. Furthermore, James has served the profession as a senior leader within the ‘Australian Physiotherapy Association’ and as National Chair of ‘Musculoskeletal Physiotherapy Australia’.

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Rapid Fire Showcase speakers

Dr Kristie Matthews

Dr Kristie Matthews is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Primary and Allied Health Care, and Senior Research Fellow with the Monash Centre for Scholarship in Health Education at Monash University. Kristie is a radiation therapist by background, and has completed a Masters in Training and Development and PhD. Kristie’s research interests are health professional student preparedness for practice, and health professions workforce redesign.

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Dr Liza Seubert

Dr Liza Seubert BPharm PhD SFHEA FPSA is a pharmacist with over 30 years of experience in community pharmacy, pharmacy governance and teaching pharmacy. She is the Deputy Head of the School of Allied Health and leads the Discipline of Pharmacy at the University of Western Australia where she has nurtured a culture of excellence and collegiality.

Dr Seubert’s passion is developing health professions students into person-centred reflective practitioners. An expert in techniques to enhance communication between consumers and health professionals, her research informs curriculum development focused on skills for personal and social accountability within Master of Pharmacy students and graduates. This work has transformed the learning experience of students. The precept she works from is that every person has their own story developed from their lived experiences and it is the health professional’s purpose to engage with people and their experiences to find the best outcomes.

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Dr Ellie Sugden

Dr Ellie Sugden is a Speech Pathologist, Lecturer and Academic Program Advisor in the School of Health Sciences at Western Sydney University. After qualifying as a speech pathologist, Ellie worked clinically in both Sydney and Melbourne with children who have communication disorders. She completed a PhD exploring how speech pathologists can best collaborate with parents of children with speech disorders. After completing postdoctoral research in Scotland, Ellie returned to Australia in early 2021 to commence her position at Western Sydney University. Ellie coordinates and teaches several subjects in the undergraduate speech pathology program at Western Sydney University and supports curriculum development across the program. She is interested in how to best support students to become speech pathologists who can respond to new and evolving clinical practice needs in the future. Ellie has recently applied for Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy.

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Graduate speakers

Lana Dwyer

In June of this year, Lana graduated from a Master of Speech Pathology which she did through Charles Sturt University. This course was designed as a distance education course with intensive face-to-face components so for four years of it, she studied while teaching English as a foreign language in Germany. Since July, Lana has been working as a Graduate Speech Pathologist at an organisation called Ability Action Australia. In this job, she works in a multidisciplinary team and their clients are all NDIS participants with a wide range of disabilities.

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Emma Montgomery

Emma completed her Bachelor of Physiotherapy at the University of Canberra and is an active member of the Australian Physiotherapy Association, as a committee member of the ACT Branch Council. She currently works as a physiotherapist at TM Physio, a private practice within Canberra focusing on community engagement and patient centred care. Emma has a keen interest in empowering patients in their own rehabilitation journey, health and wellbeing.

Notably, Emma has travelled with the ACT Gymnastics Team to the 2022 Gymnastics Nationals in the Gold Coast and has experience covering premier league soccer teams including Canberra United Academy and Weston Molongolo FC. As a student, Emma was heavily involved in the wellbeing of her cohort and the wider university community, as the Student Representative for the University of Canberra Council in 2020, a student representative for her physiotherapy cohort, a lab tutor, peer assisted learning mentor and student ambassador.

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Jovana Urukalo

Jovana Urukalo is a Public Health Podiatrist currently working at NSW Health in Southeast Sydney Local Health District within the High-Risk Foot Service. Her current role involves the management of diabetic foot ulcers, peripheral vascular disease, and other complex lower limb pathologies.

Originally from Adelaide, South Australia, Jovana completed her studies at UniSA in 2018 and began working in the private sector providing podiatric care to both the adult and paediatric population. Through her work, she developed an interest in paediatrics which inspired her to begin post graduate work, studying the symptoms reported in children with flat feet. This interest led to Jovana currently undertaking a Masters by Research (MRes) postgraduate degree looking into the paediatric flat foot.

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