School dental services in Sri Lanka have supported children’s oral health for decades, yet tooth decay remains common. Uttara Amilani is exploring how these services work in practice, the challenges they face, and how they can be improved.
In 2025, I began my PhD at AusHSI to investigate the economic burden of work-related injuries (WRIs) in Australia using linked data from five statewide routinely collected sources to help build a more complete picture.
Read our 2026 Statistics Leadership Symposium recap and presentation highlights from members of the AusHSI Higher Degree Research Team, who reflect on their experiences and key learnings from this inspiring event.
When I began my PhD studying virtual care, its promise felt made for the people I had grown up watching struggle to access care. If care could travel through a screen or a phone line, then distance, transport, time off work, all the old barriers, might simply dissolve. My job was to ask the question: does virtual care actually deliver value, and crucially, for whom?
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common type of cancer that occurs in the liver. It has become the fastest-rising cause of cancer mortality in Australia, and detecting HCC early is very important. AusHSI PhD student, Inosha Alwis, is researching cost-effective, patient-centred HCC surveillance programs to help improve survival rates.
When I started at QUT, exploring opioid use after spinal cord injury, I thought I was signing up to learn new methods, generate outputs, and deepen my expertise. And while all of that has been true, it’s not what has stayed with me most. What I didn’t expect was how much a PhD would shape the kind of person and academic I want to become.
Despite the financial pressures my family has faced, I’ve been extraordinarily fortunate to pursue postgraduate study, and ultimately a PhD examining the financial burden of childhood cancer. My research focuses on the out-of-pocket costs families face, what makes financial aid schemes succeed or fail in practice, and what families actually value in financial support models.
My PhD project aims to develop a model of care that improves mental health service access for young people in rural and regional Queensland. Building on findings from The Bridging Study, I will analyse contextual factors affecting service delivery to inform co-construction of the care model in consultation with key stakeholders.
Opioids are widely prescribed for pain management, especially after injury or surgery. My study goes beyond merely describing prescribing patterns over time to investigate whether the timing and recurrence of health events are key drivers of long-term opioid use.
Clinical decision support systems (CDSSs) hold enormous promise for improving healthcare delivery. Yet, when introduced into the complex realities of busy hospitals, CDSSs often struggle to deliver in practice. My research uses implementation science frameworks to identify and inform the step-by-step processes needed for lasting adoption.
