MRFF provides $31 million boost to UQ research

University of Queensland researchers have secured almost $31 million from the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) to tackle health and medical challenges in Australia and around the world.

The 21 UQ projects include research to improve the quality of life for people with dementia and their carers, support parents of children with neurodevelopmental disabilities, and reduce hospital re-admissions for high-risk cardiology patients.

The largest grant from the MRFF to UQ will support research to improve the diagnosis and management of sleep apnoea in First Nations peoples by designing treatment programs in partnership with local communities to help ensure their ongoing success. 

MRFF Grant Scheme recipients

2022 Clinician Researchers: Nurses, Midwives and Allied Health

• Professor Amanda Ullman – Building capacity to prevent healthcare harm for hospitalised infants (Type 1 hybrid randomised controlled trial)
• Dr Koa Whittingham – Randomised trial of parenting acceptance and commitment therapy for parents of children with neurodevelopmental disabilities
• Professor Michele Sterling – Implementing integrated psychological and physical care for Australians after road traffic injury

2021 Maternal Health and Healthy Lifestyles

• Associate Professor Federica Barzi – Closing the gaps in maternal and infant health: the Deadly Fit Mums program

2021 Consumer-Led Research

• Dr Sarah Wallace - Bridging the digital divide: building health self-efficacy through communication-accessible online environments  

2021 Early to Mid-Career Researchers

• Associate Professor Fernando de Souza Fonseca Guimaraes – Personalising innate-immunotherapy for superior treatment outcomes with large anticancer applicability
• Dr Sarah Reedman – Community-based adaptive exercise for cardiorespiratory health in young people with moderate to severe cerebral palsy
• Dr Natalee Newton – Broad-spectrum vaccine design for flaviviruses and henipaviruses
• Dr Yaqoot Fatima – Obstructive sleep apnoea diagnosis and management in First Nations communities: community co-design, local capacity building and place-based models for sustainable success
• Associate Professor Henry Marshall – Maximising uptake of lung cancer screening and smoking cessation outcomes

2021 Primary Health Care Digital Innovations

• Associate Professor Srinivas Kondalsamy Chennakesavan - Digital health transformation of rural primary health care through an innovative digital Indigenous primary health care delivery model

2021 Clinical Trials Activity

• Professor David Johnson – Incremental dialysis to improve health in people starting haemodialysis
• Professor Michele Sterling –Preventing chronic pain after whiplash road traffic injury

2022 Effective Treatments and Therapies 

• Professor Stewart Trost – Implementation and scale-up of a consumer co-designed physical activity program for people with moderate-to-profound disabilities

2022 Stem Cell Therapies

• Professor Ernst Wolvetang – Creating a replicable therapeutic framework for hereditary spastic paraplegias

2022 Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care

• Associate Professor Nadeeka Dissanayaka – Enhancing utility of neuropsychological evaluation for earlier and effective diagnosis of dementia in Parkinson’s disease
• Professor Piers Dawes – Home hearing and vision care to improve quality of life for people with dementia and carers
• Professor Loc Do – Addressing oral health inequity and unmet dental care needs in vulnerable populations

2022 Quality, Safety and Effectiveness of Medicine Use and Medicine Intervention by Pharmacists

• Dr Laetitia Hattingh – Optimising medicine information handover during transitions of care
• Professor Jason Roberts – Pharmacogenomics for better treatment of fungal infections in cancer
• Associate Professor Michael Barras – Reducing hospital re-admission for high-risk cardiology patients

The full list of funding outcomes is available on the MRFF website.

Media: UQ Communications, communications@uq.edu.au, +61 429 056 139.