Central Clinical School awarded $7M through MRFF for medical research

The Australian Government has awarded more than $53M through the Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) to 21 Monash researchers for research into cardiovascular disease, respiratory disease, dementia, cancer, primary health care, nutrition and more.

Four of these projects, totalling over $7M, were awarded to Central Clinical School researchers.

Professor Terence O’Brien received $3M for a world-first trial of a drug treatment for poorly controlled epilepsy. This new drug is the first potentially curative drug for people with epilepsy who are resistant to control with current anti-seizure drugs.

Associate Professor Natasha Smallwood received $2M for a primary care technology-enabled intervention to improve symptom self-management for people with chronic respiratory illness.

New staff appointments

We are pleased to announce that Dr Michelle Zajac has been appointed as the new School Manager of the Central Clinical School (CCS) and A/Prof Andrew Stewardson has been appointed as the new Director and Associate Professor of Infection Prevention and Hospital Epidemiology at Alfred Health (a joint appointment between Alfred Health and CCS).

Michelle is well known to the School, having done an outstanding job as our Senior Research Manager at CCS since 2019, and Senior Research and Operations Manager at CCS since 2021. During this time, Michelle has successfully executed a broad range of management responsibilities while also overseeing a considerable growth in the research income of the School and the Monash-Alfred Clinical Trials Program.

A/Prof Stewardson has been with the Alfred and Monash University since 2017 and has made stellar contributions across clinical service, quality improvement and research in the area of Infection Prevention and Control. He has emerged as one of the leading national experts in Infection Prevention and Control, including being the immediate past Chair of the Healthcare Infection Control Special Interest Group of the Australasian Society of Infectious Diseases, and member of the national Infection Control Expert Group (ICEG) and the Infection Prevention and Control Panel for the National COVID-19 Clinical Evidence Taskforce.