The Expert Committee

Adjunct Professor of Neurosurgery, School of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Adelaide

Head Department of Neurosurgery Royal Adelaide Hospital retired in 2004.

President of the International Neurotrauma Society 2004 to 2006.

Past Chairman of the Neurotrauma Committee of the Asian Australasian Society of Neurological Surgery convening annual or biannual workshops on TBI to 2019.

Member of the WFNS Mass Casualty Committee.

Chairman Expert Review Committee Connectivity TBI Australia

Published particularly in field of brain injury: co-editor and co-author of several neurotrauma texts.

Professor Elizabeth Kendall is a Professor of Disability and Rehabilitation at the Menzies Health Institute Queensland, Griffiths University, and is the Executive Director of The Hopkins Centre – Research for Rehabilitation and Resilience.

Since completing her PhD on Adjustment following Traumatic Injury in 1997, Prof Kendall has built a research agenda in rehabilitation and service systems for people who are managing the consequences of serious injuries, disabilities or chronic conditions.

As a part of her work, Prof Kendall has amassed over $50 million in research grants and consultancies; and has had over 200 publications in high quality journals including Social Science and Medicine, the American Journal of Public Health, Rehabilitation Psychology, and Disability and Rehabilitation. Prof Kendall has additionally designed and directed complex community evaluations, and randomised controlled trials of major health reform projects.

Lindy is a Professor of Neurotrauma, jointly appointed by Curtin University and the Perron Institute. She coordinated generation of the original national collaborative plan and is the provisional Chair of the Mission for TBI Expert Advisory Panel.

Professor D. James Cooper AO

BMBS MD FRACP FCICM FAHMS

Jamie Cooper is Sir John Monash Distinguished Professor in the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine (SPHPM) at Monash University, and Senior Specialist in Intensive Care at The Alfred Hospital, Melbourne. In 2017, he was awarded an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) for distinguished service to intensive care medicine in the field of traumatic brain injury as a clinician, and to medical education as an academic, researcher and author. In 2021, Professors Jamie Cooper and Rinaldo Bellomo were jointly awarded the Research Australia GSK Award for Research Excellence (ARE) in recognition of their global leadership and innovative research in critical care medicine that has helped transform approaches to the treatment of critically ill patients worldwide. The GSK ARE is one of the most prestigious awards available to the Australian medical research community. Prof Cooper is a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Practitioner Fellow, full Professor of Intensive Care Medicine at Monash University and Hon. Professorial Fellow in the Critical Care and Trauma Division at The George Institute for Global Health, University of Sydney. He has >400 publications including 18 in New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), The Lancet, and Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). He has been a Principal or Co-investigator on peer reviewed research grants exceeding $91M including 45 NHMRC/MRFF grants. Research foci include randomised clinical trials in traumatic brain injury (TBI), sepsis, acute lung injury, resuscitation fluids, and blood transfusion.

He has published three landmark trials including the DECRA trial (CIA NHMRC#314502), which demonstrated unexpectedly inferior long-term outcomes for an increasingly popular neurosurgical intervention (early decompressive craniectomy) that was opposite to apparent short-term benefits, and has initiated international TBI practice review. The trial results were fast tracked for NEJM publication (Cooper DJ, et al. 2011) and were editorialised in the Lancet as one of the most important clinical trials of a therapy for severe TBI ever conducted. The trial results have been a watershed in changing current practice and have proved invaluable from both an individual patient and community perspective. This has been incorporated into the international Brain Trauma Foundation practice guidelines. Using alternative therapies will improve TBI patient outcomes and substantially reduce health care spending on lifetime care of severe disability survivors. DECRA was included in Yale Universitys 50 most important papers of all time that shaped the current clinical practice of neurology and was also included in the 50 of the most important studies in Critical Care Medicine by Harvard University and Oxford University Press.

Jennie Ponsford, AO, BA (Hons), MA (Clin Neuropsych), PhD, MAPsS, is a Professor of Neuropsychology and Director of Clinical Programs in the School of Psychological Sciences at Monash University and Director of the Monash-Epworth Rehabilitation Research Centre at Epworth Hospital in Melbourne.

She has spent 40 years engaged in clinical work and research with individuals with mild, moderate and severe traumatic brain injury, investigating outcomes and the efficacy of rehabilitative interventions, and publishing 2 books and over 370 journal articles and book chapters. She is Past-President of the International Neuropsychological Society, the International Association for the Study of Traumatic Brain Injury and the Australasian Society for the Study of Brain Impairment, and serves on the Executive of the International Brain Injury Association and Australasian Society for the Study of Brain Impairment ASSBI.

In 2013 she was awarded the Robert L. Moody prize for Distinguished Initiatives in Brain Injury and Rehabilitation, in 2015 the International Neuropsychological Society’s Paul Satz Career Mentoring Award and in 2017 she was made an Officer of the Order of Australia for her distinguished contributions to neuropsychology and seminal advances in the diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation of patients with traumatic brain injury.

Kate King is a Clinical Nurse Consultant in Trauma at John Hunter and John Hunter Children's Hospital in Newcastle NSW and a Conjoint​ Senior Lecturer at the University of Newcastle.

Kate is a front-line worker looking after people who suffer Traumatic Brain Injuries in the acute phase of their care and across the whole spectrum from Concussion through to severe TBI. She is passionate about research that will improve the outcomes for everyone that is affected by TBI including patients, relatives, friends and workers. Kate is excited to be involved with Connectivity Traumatic Brain Injury.

Mark Walterfang is a psychiatrist and neuropsychiatrist with significant clinical experience in the management of individuals with the psychiatric aspects of traumatic brain injury, and is involved in clinical trials and research into neurodegenerative disorders, neuroimaging and traumatic brain injury.

Prof Tamara Ownsworth is a clinical neuropsychologist (BA(Hons), PhD) with extensive experience in cognitive and psychosocial intervention research for people with acquired brain injury, including traumatic brain injury, brain tumour and stroke.

Post PhD she was awarded a NHMRC Public Health Post-Doctoral fellowship (2002-2006). She is a Professor in the School of Applied Psychology at Griffith University and leads the Neuroscience Ageing and Dementia group of the Menzies Health Institute of Queensland.

She has over 150 publications and has been a CI on grants totalling approximately $15.5 million, including clinical trials funded by the NHMRC, CONROD, Cancer Council Queensland and Medical Research Future Fund. Her research focuses on improving access to rehabilitation for individuals and families impacted by neurological disorders.

Prof. Terence O'Brien is a neurological clinician-scientist, translational researcher and University/Health Service leader. He is Chair of Medicine & Head of School, The Central Clinical School, Monash University and Program Director, Alfred Brain, and Deputy Director of Research, Alfred Health. He is an FRACP specialist in neurology and clinical pharmacology, with particular expertise in epilepsy, TBI and neurodegenerative diseases, and pre-clinical and clinical trials and imaging/biomarkers.

He leads a translational research team with the goal of developing improved treatments for people with epilepsy and related brain diseases. He has published >750 peer-reviewed original papers and a PI on >150 clinical trials. He has trained and mentored multiple students, fellows and early carer researchers, from Australia and many countries of the world. He has received 18 research awards from national and international scientific bodies. He has held many major leadership roles in the Australian and International professional societies, including being President of the Epilepsy Society of Australia (2018-21), VIC/TAS State Branch Chair, Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences (2019-22) and Chair of the Translational Research Committee, American Epilepsy Society (2021-current).

Dr. Vicki Anderson BA (Hons), MA (Clin Neuropsych), PhD, FAPS, FASSA, FAAHMS, FASSBI is a paediatric clinical neuropsychologist and clinician researcher. She is currently Head, Psychology, The Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne, Professorial Fellow, Paediatrics & Psychology, University of Melbourne, and Director, Clinical Sciences Research, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute.

She is a past NHMRC Senior Practitioner Fellow (2009-2019). Her research and clinical interests are in disorders of childhood that impact on the brain, including both developmental and acquired disorders. Her recent work has focussed on translating her early career findings into clinical practice to optimise child outcomes from brain injury. Major translational achievements include: i) publication of the Test of Everyday Attention for Children, used by psychologists across the world; ii) development of easily accessed, low burden, e-health approaches to parent-focused psychosocial treatments as a means of maximising child outcomes; iii) development of a novel iPad delivered tool for assessing social cognition (PEERS).

Dr. Anderson has authored over 500 peer-reviewed publications and 6 books, and her research has attracted $45M in competitive grant funding. She is an Associate Editor for Neuropsychology (APA) and the J Neuropsychology (BPS, UK). She is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences of Australia, the Aust Psychological Society and the Aust Academy of Health and Medical Sciences, and past president of the International Neuropsychological Society.

Professor Zsolt J. Balogh is a trauma and orthopaedic surgeon, the Director of Trauma at the John Hunter Hospital and Professor of Surgery and foundation Chair of Traumatology at the University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia. His TBI related research focus is related to the pathophysiology, optimal clinical management and outcomes of severe traumatic brain injury in the context of the disease of polytrauma. Professor Balogh investigates the clinical and basic science aspects of relevant biomarkers, expeditious imaging and surgical intervention, outcome prediction and regenerative options in TBI. He is leading the implementation of clinically applicable evidence to daily practice by chairing the ANZ Trauma Care Verification Program, which sets and evaluates the standards in all trauma centres of Australasia.

Dr Sarah Hellewell is a Senior Research Fellow in Neurotrauma at Curtin University and the Perron Institute for Neurological and Translational Science. Her research uses MRI, fluid biomarkers and functional tests to understand how injury can alter brain structure and function, and how this translates to cognitive and neuropsychological outcomes.

Professor Belinda Gabbe is the Co-Head of the Clinical and Health data Outcomes Innovation and Research (CHOIR) division, and Head of the Prehospital, Emergency and Trauma Research Unit, in the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Monash University. She is an National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Leadership Fellow. Her research focuses on evaluating trauma care, trauma systems research, and improving understanding of the burden of injury. Professor Gabbe is the Head of the Victorian State Trauma Registry, the Victorian Orthopaedic Trauma Outcomes Registry and the Academic Lead for Burns Registry of Australia and New Zealand.

Dr. Jenna Ziebell is a senior lecturer in the Wicking Dementia Research and Education Centre. Her research interests include the role of microglia (the brain's immune cells) in health, ageing and disease; understanding traumatic brain injury and health education. Dr. Ziebell has a strong interest in how the brain's immune system is altered, or primed, with ageing or injury and how this may lead to neurological diseases such as dementia. Dr. Ziebell has a long-standing interest in the role of inflammation in neurological diseases, particularly the role of microglia. She is a mid-career researcher who established the Microglia and Neurological Diseases Laboratory at the University of Tasmania. Prior to this Jenna co-established the Translational Neurotrauma Program in Phoenix, AZ, USA; where she led a research team that investigated the role of microglia in acute neurological diseases. Her interest in the role of microglia in health and disease was ignited during her PhD at Monash University and has continued throughout postdoctoral research at the University of Adelaide (2009-2011), University of Kentucky (2012), USA, and University of Arizona/Phoenix Childrens Hospital (2012-2015). Dr Ziebells areas of interest include microglial activation in health and disease, trauma and injury related circuitry rearrangements, microglial priming and senescence in ageing and dementia; and more recently the impact of intimate partner violence.

Dr. Nasrallah is a neuroscientist with a background in magnetic resonance and interdisciplinary brain research. She graduated with a PhD in neurochemistry and NMR from the Neuroscience Research Australia Institute (NeurRA) at the University of New South Wales in 2009. In April 2009, She spent 3 years at the Singapore Bioimaging Consortium (A*STAR) where she pioneered the use of magnetic resonance imaging as a tool in cognitive brain research in the rodent. In 2013, she was appointed as senior research fellow at the Clinical Imaging Research Center where she delved into the clinical realms of human imaging. In late 2015, she returned to Australia as a Motor Accident and Injury Commission fellow at the Queensland Brain Institute (QBI) at the University of Queensland (UQ) where she independently heads her own group. Her research spans basic and clinical brain research with the the overall aim of understanding how the brain functions in health and injury, specifically, developing methods for early diagnosis of primary biomarkers following injury and translating these findings.

Professor Karen Barlow is a Paediatric Neurologist and expert in Traumatic Brain Injury in childhood. She has had significant impact in the assessment and management of concussion. Prof. Barlows research focuses on the predictors of, and interventions for, those people who have poor or delayed recovery, also known as persisting post-concussion symptoms.