Winter research projects
Applications for the 2023 Winter Research Program are now closed.
General information on the program, including how to apply, is available from the UQ Student Employability Centre’s program website.
Explore the previous winter research projects:
Experiences of concussion/mild traumatic brain injury
Supervisor Dr Caitlin Hamilton
Concussion/mild Traumatic Brain Injury (mTBI) is a traumatically induced physiological disruption of brain function that manifests any period of loss of consciousness, any loss of memory for events immediately before or after the accident, any alteration in mental state at the time of the accident, or focal neurological deficits that may or may not be transient but where the severity of the injury does not exceed a loss of consciousness of approximately 30 minutes or less, after 30 minutes, an initial Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) of 13-15, and post traumatic amnesia (PTA) is not great than 24 hours. Symptoms of concussion may be physical, cognitive and/or behavioural. While most people recover from a concussion after a short period of rest and gradual return to everyday activities, some people continue to experience symptoms of which the extent may not become apparent until they attempt to return to their usual activities.
Prolonged and continued symptoms, known as Persisting Post-Concussion Symptoms (PPCS) may last for months or years and can have a significant impact on a person’s everyday life, including their ability to perform activities of daily living and work, and their relationships with others. Understanding the experience of people who have had a concussion is therefore important to best inform healthcare services and interventions to address prolonged symptoms.
Specifically, this research aims to understand the experience of adults who have had a concussion. This includes contributing within a team to a review of the literature and qualitative research that aims to understand the experiences of returning to usual activities and healthcare received.
The student will be involved in article screening processes, qualitative data collection/management, contributing to data analysis, and some writing tasks (e.g. writing a literature review/introduction for a paper, writing a methods section, writing a draft discussion for a paper).
Health Services Research - within the Centre for Functioning and Health Research, Queensland Health
Supervisor Prof Elizabeth Ward and Dr Clare Burns
The winter scholar will be working with Prof Liz Ward across a range of current speech pathology projects within Metro South Hospital and Health service and Metro North Hospital and Health Service. These projects will include studies involving (but not exclusively limited to) dysphagia services, telehealth, and head and neck cancer research.
Infant and maternal care for families from multicultural backgrounds
Supervisor Dr Emma Crawford
In this project, students will be involved in data collection, data management and data analysis related to infant and maternal care in intercultural contexts.
Sports Priorities and Objectives for Research and Translation in Youth with childhood onset disability (The SPORTY project)
Supervisor Dr Georgina Clutterbuck
Children with disabilities participate in less physical activity than their typically developing peers. Recent research has investigated the effectiveness of interventions aiming to improve physical activity levels in specific populations (e.g. improving sports participation in children with cerebral palsy), however this research has been directed by researchers, rather than people with lived experience of childhood-onset disability who receive the interventions, or the clinicians providing that intervention. The establishment of research and translation priorities from the perspective of end-users is essential to ensure that interventions researched are meaningful, feasible and efficient for their target audience, and that uptake and upscale processes are timely and sustainable in practice. The Winter Scholar will participate in the development, facilitation and/or analysis of focus groups of clinicians in the health and sports sectors to identify their experiences in sports-focused interventions, and their priorities for future research. They will also participate in a systematic review of sports participation assessments for children and youth with disability.
Substance use and traumatic brain injury: Exploring the nexus between causes and outcomes
Supervisor Dr Hannah Gullo
An updated systematic review of the literature is warranted to inform clinical practice. The review will aim to answer the following questions:
- What proportion of patients with TBI (a) were intoxicated at the time of injury, (b) had a pre-injury history of substance misuse, and (c) misused substances post-injury?
- What influence, if any, did alcohol or other substance misuse have on outcomes for patients with TBI?
Clinical implementation of a comprehensive, high-dose aphasia treatment (CHAT) and TeleCHAT
Supervisor Dr Jade Dignam and Dr Annie Hill
CHAT is the first intensive, comprehensive aphasia program to be delivered in a public hospital and health service in Australia. This project is a partnership between the Queensland Aphasia Research Centre, UQ and the speech pathology department at the Surgical, Treatment and Rehabilitation Service (STARS). This project aims to evaluate the process and clinical effectiveness of implementing CHAT in a clinical rehabilitation context. TeleCHAT is the telerehabilitaiton delivery of the CHAT program and is the first ICAP to be fully delivered by telerehabilitation. This project aims to evalute the clinical effectiveness of TeleCHAT and explore this service delivery model as being non-inferior to the in-person model.
Still HELPing: The lived experience of Paediatric Feeding Disorder
Supervisor Dr Jeanne Marshall and Dr Rebecca Packer
This study’s primary aim is to describe the long-term lived experience of PFD in a group of families who accessed a feeding intervention study (Healthy Eating Learning Program – HELP study) between 2012 and 2015. The perspectives of parents, siblings and the children themselves where possible will be explored. A qualitative descriptive study design will be used to address these aims. It is hoped that this information will be used to increase awareness of the long-term impacts of feeding difficulties and guide child and family centred care.
Understanding the human-animal bond between pet dogs and their owners through the lens of attachment theory: A national survey study
Supervisor Dr Jess Hill, A/Prof Carlie Driscoll, and Prof Pamela Meredith
This project involved the completion of a national survey study. Through the lens of attachment theory, this survey aimed to investigate the perceptions of dog owners who belived themselves to have a secure relationship with their dog/s, regarding what factors influenced the development of this relationship. The student involved in this project will assist in the data analysis of survey results, as well as preparation of a manuscript for publication.
Developmental Paediatrics: improving children’s participation at home, school and in the community
Supervisor A/Prof Leanne Johnston
Scholars will work with expert paediatric researchers and industry clinicians to investigate how to improve the participation of children with movement disorders in the home, school and community environment. Scholars will spend time on 3 projects:
- Project 1 (Johnston, Ryan) involves assisting staff to develop a fun child-led goal-setting App and process to guide participation focussed intervention in therapy. No prior technology experience is required.
- Project 2 (Johnston, Quartermaine) involves assisting staff to explore school-based participation in terms of the school readiness needs expressed by children with cerebral palsy and their families.
- Project 3 (Johnston, SHRS Paeds team) involves assisting staff to determine the best assessments to identify participation and other difficulties being experienced by children referred to the UQ therapy clinics.
Working collaboratively: Self-regulation to achieve common goals
Supervisor Mrs Liz Springfield
Working collaboratively as part of a team is a key competency required for professional practice in occupational therapy. Development of self-regulation strategies to support collaboration has not previously been explored with occupational therapy students. This research project explores the use of self-regulation strategies used by OT students during completion of group authentic assessment activities. Outcomes of this research will be used to inform design of strategies to support development of self-regulation to support collaboration in teamwork and publication of these outcomes.
Occupational therapy student standardised patient interview experience: Ensuring equity, inclusivity and sustainability
Supervisor Mrs Liz Springfield and Dr Caitlin Hamilton
Students completing introductory courses in the UG and GEMS occupational therapy program complete standardised patient interview experiences (SPIE) to develop competencies required for clinical practice. This mixed methods research project aims to explore the experience of students, student mentors, clinical educators and standardised patients involved in the OCTY1205/7809 SPIE to develop understanding of preparation, feedback process and assessment of outcomes. Expected outcomes of this project will include publications and will inform future design of standardised patient learning experiences.
Factors influencing the differential diagnosis of cervical spine conditions
Supervisor Dr Lucy Thomas and Dr Julia Treleaven
Headache, neck pain and dizziness are common features of cervical spine musculoskeletal conditions, but they can also be early indicators of other non-musculoskeletal conditions such as vestibular pathology eg benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV), vestibular migraine, concussion or more serious pathologies such as arterial dissection, VBI. The aims of these projects are to improve the differential diagnosis of headache, neck pain and dizziness and identify clinical measures which can be used to direct appropriate management. Another project will look at qualitative interviews in people with tension type headache. Another project will be finalising data for VBI research. One project will involve the collection and analysis of specific variables from existing data. These results will either be compared to each other or to data from a general population cohort.
Implementation of the comprehensive, high-dose aphasia treatment (CHAT) program
Supervisor Dr Marie McSween
The overall aim of this project is to investigate: investigate: 1) the implementation of the CHAT program; 2) effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of CHAT compared to usual care; and 3) whether implementing CHAT results in increased knowledge and skills of speech pathologists in delivering comprehensive, high-dose aphasia treatments. This project will be conducted in two phases: 1) usual care, where current speech pathologist practice relating to aphasia rehabilitation will be monitored (years 1-2); and 2) implementation of the CHAT program (years 3-4). Running concurrent to phase 1 and in preparation for phase 2, a preparatory phase will be conducted to inform the implementation strategy for program scale-up.
The winter scholar project will support the development of training resources for use during the preparatory and CHAT implementation phases.
Client and therapist perceived experience and impact of an online therapy toolkit on preparedness for learning to drive
Supervisor Dr Melanie Hoyle, A/Prof Jacki Liddle, and Jenny Gribbin - Driving Well Occupational Therapy (Industry Partner)
The aim of this project is to explore the perceived user experience and impact of an online curriculum on preparedness for driving. These user experience findings will be utilised for grant applications to continue development of the toolkit and research the effectiveness of the driving therapy activities.
How can we improve recovery, rehabilitation and holistic care after stroke?
Supervisor Dr Niru Mahendran and Miss Neelam Nayak
One Australian experiences a first-time stroke every 19-minutes, with almost half going on to have a second, more disabling stroke. The 2020 Australian stroke services audit identified that 64% of stroke survivors discharged from rehabilitation still required support. Thus, strategies to improve recovery after stroke and prevent recurrent stroke and permanent disability are required. This program of work explores this problem by approaching the problem from 3 angles:
- Look at current rehabilitation practice, and enhance the quality and delivery of evidence-based care (thus ways to improve the rehabilitation that an individual receives).
- Understand the health system and identify strategies that are feasible to implement within current resource constraints
- Explore lived experience with people living with stroke in Australia.
A year in the life: The impact of MND dysarthria on close communication partners
Supervisor Dr Rebecca Packer and Dr Salma Charania
Motor neurone disease (MND) is a fatal neurodegenerative disorder of the motor system, impacting an individual’s ability to walk, breathe, swallow, and speak. The progressive loss of communication is one of the most distressing and debilitating symptoms for people with MND (PwMND). However, little is known about the impacts of progressive communication loss experienced by PwMND on their close communication partners despite research showing carers of PwMND experience depression (Trail et al., 2003), reduced social closeness with family and friends (Mckelvey et al., 2012), and lower quality of life compared to other progressive neurodegenerative diseases (Kristjanson et al., 2006). Therefore, the aim of this project is to identify the impact progressive dysarthria experienced by PwMND has on close communication partners with disease progression.
Exploring allied health career intentions in Australia
Supervisor Dr Roma Forbes and Dr Alana Dinsdale
Australian allied health professionals have previously predicted relatively short careers, with some reports suggesting that over half of all physiotherapists predict staying in the profession for less than 15 years and over half of all new graduates from one Australian university predicting a career of less than ten years. Several reasons have been proposed for such short career intentions from remuneration through to concerns regarding recognition of skills. Much of this research is over ten years old and may not reflect the contemporary practices and experiences of those within the workforce. This project will be using in-depth interviews to explore workplace satisfaction and career intention of allied health professionals in Australia. Results may provide insight into why health professionals may choose to leave or stay in the current workforce, including factors that are perceived to influence career intentions.
Preparing students and graduates for the National Disability Insurance Scheme and Private Practice settings
Supervisor Dr Roma Forbes and Dr Melanie Hoyle
The aim of this specific study is to explore clinical educator perspectives on student preparedness for engaging in NDIS funded services and private practice settings and provide recommendations for student pre-clinical training.
Identifying the active ingredients of treatments used by speech pathologists: a scoping review
Supervisor Dr Sam Harvey
Background: Speech pathologists provide a large variety of behavioural treatments across broad practice areas (e.g., motor-speech, language, communication, swallowing, voice) and across the lifespan. Many treatments are known to be effective, but the mechanisms underlying effective treatment are rarely understood.
Effective treatments contain active ingredients. Active ingredients are the actions performed by the therapy provider and therapy recipient during treatment which lead to positive behaviour change. For example, a person who has hypokinetic dysarthria undertakes voice therapy with the goal of increasing vocal loudness and being able to sustain a loud enough voice to participate in a conversation in a busy café. What are the actions performed during voice therapy (e.g., vocal function exercises, educational counselling) that may lead to this person achieving these goals? In other words, what are the active ingredients of voice therapy for hypokinetic dysarthria?
Identifying the active ingredients of speech pathology treatments will enhance understanding of how treatments work and for whom, and will lead to critical improvements in treatment efficacy and efficiency across the discipline of speech pathology.
Research question: What are the active ingredients of treatment used to treat disorders of motor-speech, language, communication, swallowing and voice?
Aims: This project aims to identify and map the active ingredients of treatment used to treat disorders of motor-speech, language, communication, swallowing and voice. It will identify active ingredients that are common across practice areas and active ingredients that are unique to a particular therapy approach. It is hypothesised that a large number of active ingredients will have been theorised to exist but that relatively few will have empirical evidence supporting their existence.
Methods: Scoping review methodology will be used to search the speech pathology literature, organise the search yield, and report findings.
Impact: What we stand to learn from answering this question links directly with my PhD dose work and also with plans to work towards greater consistency of treatment specification and dose conceptualisation, measurement and reporting across the discipline of speech pathology.