Young HIV researcher honoured

Dr Robert Gillies

Congratulations to Dr Robert Gillies, 25, who received the Victoria Day Award for Public and Community Service by a Younger Victorian!

Dr Gillies is a junior doctor at The Alfred, and works 60 hours a week on six social initiatives he has founded, including an organisation that arranges volunteer trips to remote Indigenous communities and the not-for-profit "HoMie" streetwear label and retail store employing people struggling with homelessness.

He is also a HIV researcher, having presented his research at the International AIDS Conference and the San Francisco Liver Conference.

"It's a tremendous honour, not just to me, but to the teams of volunteers that give up their time every single day to help raise awareness for the thousands of homeless people in our community," he said.

"Homelessness is just so on the doorstep, it's just in your face everyday so me and the people that started HoMie just absolutely felt that we had to do something more, and it just started by educating ourselves.

"I'm really hoping that we are able to leverage today's honour and recognition with potential future sponsors and volunteers and any help is greatly appreciated."

The Victorian of the Year honour has been awarded since 1995.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-07-03/mike-brady-up-there-cazaly-songwriter-victorian-of-the-year/8672726

Congratulations to Robert Gillies for being one of 2016 JCI Ten Outstanding Young Persons of the World

Robert Gillies, Year 5 medical student

Congratulations to Robert Gillies for being one of 2016 JCI Ten Outstanding Young Persons of the World!

 

Robert Gillies is a Year 5 Monash Medical student and has officially been voted as one of the JCI 10 Outstanding Young Persons of the World. He is the only awardee from Australia! The awards will be made on 3 November 2016.

You can read about Robbie and the other recipients at: http://www.jci.cc/news/2129/Announcing+the+2016+JCI+TOYP+Honorees or see excerpt below.

Medical student mentoring at Central Clinical School/Alfred Health

by Robert Gillies, Year 5D MBBS student

The Academic Mentor Program is a student-run initiative that was established long before I started studying at Monash. It involves final year medical students volunteering an hour of their time per week to tutor and mentor an assigned group of third year students.

The tutes are unique in that they can be exam-focused, and are peer-driven; so they are less formal and can be more flexible, which facilitates a different kind of learning. Though the tutorials aren't compulsory for third year medical students, I remember them being a great networking opportunity.

 There's so much more than medicine that you can learn from older students - you can learn how to cope with difficult patient interactions, how to balance study and life commitments, about research or extracurricular activities, and everything in between.