$20 million investment towards health and medical research partnerships

This funding investment will support partnerships aimed at improving health and wellbeing by answering specific research questions about the delivery, organisation, funding and access to Australian health services.

Administered through NHMRC’s Partnership Projects grant scheme, 17 research teams will receive funding to work collaboratively with partners to undertake research, and to interpret and translate the findings into health policy and practice.

Dr Orin Chisholm from the University of Sydney will establish horizon scanning of new medical and health technologies in Australia, focusing on the key needs of Commonwealth and state government decision makers.

Dr Chisholm’s goal is to support health service preparedness and health system adaptation to emerging disruptive technology, consequently helping streamline the review and implementation of new technologies and reducing patient delays.

Among the projects receiving funding also includes:

• Dr Anna Balabanski from the University of Melbourne will transform prehospital stroke care by undertaking a world first study using brain scanners in air ambulances across regional and remote areas of Australia.
• Professor Dion Stub from Monash University will partner with health services, government and consumers to introduce risk stratification and virtual care, allowing acute cardiac patients to stay at home and reducing transports to hospital and associated costs.
• Associate Professor Hannah Moore from Curtin University will lead the RISE project, guiding equitable and efficient respiratory syncytial virus immunisation policy by using real world data and mathematical models.

Full details of the researchers and projects funded are available to download on NHMRC’s outcomes of funding rounds page.

Quotes attributable to NHMRC CEO, Professor Steve Wesselingh:

• “Partnership Projects are one example of NHMRC’s varied grant scheme portfolio, that require research quality, likelihood to influence policy and practice and effective collaboration among other criteria.
• "Partnerships formed in research projects such as these are exciting because they turn individual insights into shared breakthroughs, and when curiosity and collaboration intersect, innovation thrives."
• “Congratulations to each Chief Investigator and their research teams, receiving funding today. I can’t wait to see how you implement the knowledge gained into national health and wellbeing improvements.”