The Australasian Injury Prevention Network bi-annually hosts an awards event to recognise the diverse individuals and organisations contributions to injury prevention in Australia and New Zealand.
The AIPN Awards for 2022 were announced at the Russ Milner Memorial Lecture in April. Awards included:
-
Achievement in Research in Injury Prevention and Safety Promotion
-
Pam Albany Memorial Award: Contribution to Policy in Injury Prevention and Safety Promotion
-
Achievement in Practice in Injury Prevention and Safety Promotion
-
Special Award for Sustained Achievement in Injury Prevention
Congratulations to all awardees and thank you to those who attended.
AIPN Awards
Julieann is an Aboriginal Research Fellow within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Program at The George Institute. Julieann has dedicated her research career to injury prevention research amongst First Nations children and families. Although Julieann is an early career researcher, her research impact is extensive. Julieann’s research is innovative in use of Indigenous methods and application of First Nation’s knowledges to develop interventions with real world impact upon Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. Notably, Julieann leads multiple large grants focussed on the journey of Aboriginal children and families experiencing burn injury from the point of injury through treatment and aftercare.
Julieann has forged strong relationships built on trust and integrity in her role as an Aboriginal researcher and in her commitment to giving back to community. Nationally Julieann collaborates with other research institutes, universities, Aboriginal community-controlled health services and communities, and internationally through her work in bringing together First Nations voices in injury prevention. Julieann is a compelling communicator and has spoken nationally and internationally on her work in burns prevention and culturally safe interventions among Aboriginal children and families. Julieann is dedicated to cultivating others, having supervised and mentored countless students and staff within her own team and beyond, always finding time to mentor, provide direction and support. She is committed to building researcher capacity among junior colleagues, particularly in the application of Indigenous research methodologies and novel methods such as mapping patient injury journeys.
Isaac is a leading practitioner in the field of injury prevention in Aotearoa New Zealand, having been the strategic and operational leader accountable for the delivery of ACC’s Injury Prevention Strategy, investment portfolio, partnerships and interventions for over seven years. More recently, Isaac worked with the wider Injury Prevention team and ACC to develop ‘Preventable’, an injury prevention initiative originally based on British Columbia’s Preventable programme.
Prior to this initiative, Isaac noted that much of ACC’s work revolved around specific programmes that targeted specific audiences about particular injury risks. An opportunity for a widespread campaign addressing system level behavioural risks was identified. Isaac and the wider ACC team took studied the behavioural motivations and barriers related to risk taking using a mixed-method approach, and developed a campaign that was informed by the cultural context of Aotearoa New Zealand. The campaign that urges people to ‘have a hmm’ in order to assess risk in a range of contexts received substantial attention from the public and is now being evaluated for a potential scale up.
Isaac and his team also spearheaded the genesis of the primary prevention systems approach to the elimination of family and sexual violence in Aotearoa New Zealand. Benchmarked from the primary prevention of violence against women and their children in Australia, this approach is shifts from individual, targeted programmes to investing in innovation and systems-based thinking. At ACC, this has taken the form of Manini Tua, ACC’s Theory of Change, which has been informed by Māori and indigenous knowledge. This is a Te Tiriti o Waitangi based approach that visualises ACC’s aspiration for a safe and inclusive Aotearoa by 2040, 100 years since the signing of Te Tiriti of Waitangi, the founding document for Aotearoa New Zealand.
Professor Caroline Finch AO is one of Australia’s leading injury prevention epidemiologists, with significant recognition for her sports safety research. Her research has directly informed the conduct and evaluation of injury surveillance, development of safety policy and implementation of injury prevention programs. In 2018, she was appointed as Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) for “distinguished service to sports medicine, particularly in the area of injury prevention as an educator, researcher and author, and to the promotion of improved health in athletes and those who exercise”.
In 2015, she received the International Distinguished Career Award (American Public Health Association’s Injury Control and Emergency Health Services Section). She has been ranked as one of the most highly published injury researchers ever and top three most influential sports injury researchers internationally. Since beginning her injury research in 1992, she has demonstrated a strong commitment to informing (inter)national strategy (WHO falls prevention, Aust Injury Prevention Strategy, National Sports Injury Strategy) and impacting policy (Government Departments of Sport and Health, health promotion/injury prevention agencies, and peak sports bodies). Her research has been funded by the ARC, NHMRC, National/State government health/sport departments) and relevant industry peak sporting bodies (including the International Olympic Committee (IOC), World Rugby, AFL and Cricket Australia).
Prof Finch is highly committed to developing the next generation of injury researchers, policy workers and prevention practitioners, including formal supervision/training of 32 PhD/MSc candidates, 9 NHMRC Research Fellows and 9 work placement traineeships in all areas of safety including falls, drowning, poisoning, scalds, sport and road trauma.
Our recently passed dear friend Marilyn Lyford was a past President of the AIPN and a tireless and passionate injury prevention advocate, researcher and practitioner. Marilyn worked across several sectors of injury prevention and safety promotion in Australia, mainly working in close partnership with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and focusing on injury prevention among rural and remote populations. Working in partnership with communities, Marilyn made substantial and long-lasting contributions to research of water safety, child car seat use, road trauma, safe systems and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health. Marilyn’s approach to her injury prevention research was both respectful and impactful. Her work has no doubt contributed to keeping people safe and preventing serious injury across Australia.
Best policy and practice oral presentations:
Joint Winners: Emily Anderson, Injury Matters & Susan Teerds, Kidsafe Queensland
Best research oral presentation:
Rebecca Lilley, Injury Prevention Research Unit, University of Otago
Best student presentation:
Joint Winners: Jared Brown, Sydney Children’s Hospital Network & Catherine Niven, Queensland University of Technology
Best poster presentation:
Lauren Miller, James Cook University
14th Australasian Injury Prevention and Safety Promotion Conference Awards (2019)
