Professor Rob Moodie, Professor of Public Health, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health,University of Melbourne

Rob is Professor of Public Health at the University of Melbourne. He first worked inrefugee health care in the Sudan with Save the Children and MSF, and later for Congressin Alice Springs. He has worked for the Burnet Institute, WHO and UNAIDS andwas CEO of VicHealth from 1998 to 2007. He chaired the National Preventative Health Task Forcefrom 2008-2011. Earlier this year he led a team that wrote the Profits and Pandemics paper in theLancet. He is co-author of four books, his most recent being Recipes for a Great Life, written withGabriel Gate.

Professor Kerry Arabena, Chair of Indigenous Health, Centre for Health and Society, University of Melbourne

Prof Arabena is Chair for Indigenous Health and Professor and Director, Onemda VicHealth Koori Health Unit, and formerly the Professor and Director of Indigenous Health Research in the School for Indigenous Health, Monash University. A descendant of the Meriam people of the Torres Strait, and a former social worker with a doctorate in human ecology, Professor Arabena has an extensive background in public health, administration, community development and research working in senior roles in indigenous policy and sexual health. Her work has been in areas such as gender issues, social justice, human rights, access and equity, service provision, harm minimisation, and citizenship rights and responsibilities. She was a founding Co-Chair of the new national Indigenous peak body, the National Congress of Australia’s First Peoples, a collective voice to lobby governments on Indigenous issues.

Associate Professor Lisa Bourke, Rural Health Academic Centre, University of Melbourne

Lisa is a Rural Sociologist at the Rural Health Academic Centre, The University of Melbourne based in Shepparton Victoria.  Lisa has more than twenty years experience conducting national, state and community research projects rural communities in the U.S. and Australia.  Lisa’s key research interests include rural health as a discipline, the wellbeing of rural young people, the inclusion of rural health consumers and rural community resilience.  Her current research projects address conceptual understanding of rural health and the ways young people from northern Victoria engage with the concept of sexual health. 

Associate Professor Jane Hocking, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne

Jane is an epidemiologist whose research interests include the epidemiology and control of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) with a particular interest in evaluating interventions to improve and prevention and control of genital chlamydia infection. She holds an NHMRC Senior Research Fellowship and is employed at the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health at the University of Melbourne.  Her research has included generating Australia’s first population-based chlamydia prevalence and incidence estimates.  She leads a team of 20 national and international investigators on the Australian Chlamydia Control Effectiveness Pilot, a cluster randomised controlled trial evaluating the impact of annual chlamydia testing of 16 to 29 year old men and women in general practice on the prevalence of chlamydia in the community. She is also running a cohort study to generate estimates of chlamydia treatment failure following treatment with azithromycin.

Associate Professor Jane Tomnay, Director, Centre For Excellence in Rural Sexual Health Rural Health Academic Centre, University of Melbourne

Jane has worked in sexual health for the past 25 years, most of her working life has been in the area of prevention of sexually transmissible infections where she has published in peer reviewed academic journals and presented her work at International and National conferences. She took up the position of Director, Centre for Excellence in Rural Sexual Health, at the Rural Health Academic Centre, at the University of Melbourne in 2009. Jane is a Registered Nurse (Division 1) and has a Master of Health Science (in advanced psychiatric nursing) and a PhD in Public Health. She is the current treasurer of the Sexual Health Society of Victoria (2013) and has been an Executive Committee member of the Australian and New Zealand Association of Nurses in AIDS Care between 2005 and 2012. 

Dr Alan Crouch, Senior Research Fellow, Rural Health Academic Centre, University of Melbourne

Alan is a population health professional with more than thirty years experience in global programs.  Prior to joining the University of Melbourne Rural Health Academic Centre as a Senior Research Fellow, he worked in a range of roles and disciplines with a diverse group of organisations including the Australian Agency for International Development, the Pan American Health Organization, the United Nations Children's Fund, The World Bank, the World Health Organisation and the Tropical Population Health Unit of the Government of Queensland, Australia. In these contexts, Alan has undertaken key roles in the implementation of more than fifty major health projects and national program assessments including those addressing sexual health and HIV/AIDS prevention, Indigenous young peoples’ health, safe blood, safe use of medicines, childhood immunisation and other health system strengthening projects in Africa, Asia, India, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Caribbean and the Western Pacific. Alan  brings this wealth of developing, middle income and industrialised country practical experience to the conference conversation on sexual health in rural Victorian settings.

Ms Jacque Phillips, CEO, Numurkah District Health Service

Jacque Phillips has worked in public hospitals specialising in paediatrics and early childhood with qualifications in midwifery, maternal child health and Community Health.  Jacque has continued to promote that every child and young person should have the opportunity to reach their potential. 

Jacque worked with families and children including young parents and was successful in attracting funding to the area for Best Start. Programs to support young parents return to education and a focus on health promotion to improve health.  A focus on rural areas has been important throughout this period.

Jacque has stayed in the Goulburn Valley holding the position Goulburn Valley Community Health Service Chief Executive Officer from 2006 and then taking her current position as Chief Executive Officer at Numurkah District Health Service in 2008 until the present time. In her current role Jacque has continued to support young people through a shared partnership model for counselling and support to the local primary and secondary schools and assisted in the establishment of the Moira 0-8 year’s group. Through a partnership approach The Hut, a youth health and wellbeing program was established in response to a local community based research project funded by Numurkah District Health Service. Now in its fourth year a multidisciplinary service is provided to improve access to health care for our young people.