Hello - we are thinking of you all in these tricky times. This month's newsletter contains ongoing online options for connection, some details on resources and support efforts, and some totally unrelated other news. Take care :)
AAAPC Annual Research Conference - 14-15 August 2020 is going ahead online
As you are probably already aware, the AAAPC 2020 Annual Research Conference will be held online this year. This is an exciting development amidst all the stress, and the Conference Subcommittee are working hard to make this an enjoyable, encouraging and enlightening event.
AAAPC Annual Research Conference - call for abstract reviewers
Each abstract will be reviewed by two peers in a double-blind process. The reviewers will score the abstracts on pre-specified criteria. Abstracts are between 250 and 500 words.
We would expect that the review process would take approximately 2-3 hours in total. If you are able to commit to reviewing abstracts at the end of March please fill in your details in the online survey via the button link below.
In line with our aim to build research capacity, we are also offering a mentoring opportunity for researchers who have not reviewed abstracts before. We welcome early career researchers, PhD students and anyone who is keen to build their skills to take advantage of our mentoring program. You will be paired with an experienced reviewer for the abstract review process.
Survey for prospective ARC 2020 abstracts reviewers
FACES stands for Friends Advancing Careers through E-based Support. It is for all AAAPC members who are interested in connecting and advancing their career through research. The first event for the year will be an interactive webinar called 'Grant writing 101 - Setting up a successful grant application' with A/Prof Jo-Anne Manski-Nankervis. It will be held on Thursday April 9th, 12 noon AEDT.
AAAPC and COVID-19
Cancer in Primary Care Survey
PC4 Research Prioritisation Survey
Celebrating some AAAPC Members
Welcome to all new AAAPC Members
A/Prof Anne Abbott is a neurologist from the Central Clinical School at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. Her work is having a significant impact in updating guidelines, policy and practice for improved stroke prevention in persons with carotid arterial disease. She is looking for collaborators in researching the best ways of preventing stroke and other arterial disease complications non-invasively. Please contact her if interested at anne.l.abbott@gmail.com.
AAAPC Annual Research Conference: August 14-15 2020
The AAAPC 2020 Annual Research Conference is fast approaching and we are all excited about meeting up at Griffith University on the sunny Gold August over August 14-15.
There are a number of details about the conference highlighted in this newsletter, and if you would like to stay even more up-to-date, keep an eye on the relevant page of the website.
The conference organising committee welcomes AAAPC members to be peer reviewers for the submitted abstracts for the 2020 conference.
Link to survey for prospective ARC 2020 abstract reviewers
AAAPC Annual Research Conference - call for abstracts open, closing in March
A reminder that the call for abstracts is now open and that submissions close Sunday March 15 2020.
We welcome abstract submissions covering the full spectrum of primary care across a range of multidisciplinary perspectives. We also welcome contributions focusing on methodological developments and challenges relevant to the field. We will consider abstracts of relevance to primary care practice, research, education, and policy.
As previously mentioned, the Australian Journal of Primary Health (AJPH) will be publishing an online supplement with the accepted abstracts from the Conference (see 2019 Issue). The supplement will be indexed on PubMed as the whole conference, not as individual abstracts. During the abstract submission process, we will request your permission to include your abstract in the AJPH supplement.
We are looking forward to welcoming you to the Gold Coast for our 2020 conference.
Dr Liz Sturgiss, on behalf of the organising committee liz.sturgiss@monash.edu
Have your say - fill in the AAAPC Membership Survey
The Executive of AAAPC will meet in March for a strategic planning meeting. To guide us, we are asking members to fill out this 5 minute survey to give us feedback on what we have done recently and how we can improve from here.
Please click the button below to complete the survey. Thank you!
AAAPC 2020 Membership Survey
FACES 2020 Events - Grant writing 101
FACES stands for Friends Advancing Careers through E-based Support. It is for all AAAPC members who are interested in connecting and advancing their career through research.
The first FACES event for the year will be an interactive webinar called 'Grant writing 101 - Setting up a successful grant application' with A/Prof Jo-Anne Manski-Nankervis. It will be held on Thursday April 9th, 12 noon AEDT.
A/Prof Manski-Nankervis is an academic general practitioner leading innovative research into the development and implementation of technology to inform decision making in general-practice. Over the last five years she has been awarded more than $6 million in funding from a variety of sources including MRFF, NHMRC, RACGP Foundation and philanthropic grants.
If you would like to sign up for the interactive webinar and FACES, you will need to register for FACES through the website by March 27. Further information (including information about future FACES events) is available on the website.
Australian Association of Practice Management Annual Survey Feedback
Recruitment is a vital but often difficult aspect of conducting research studies. The managers of general practices play key roles in recruitment to research studies being conducted by AAAPC members.
The Australian Association of Practice Management (AAPM) conducts an annual survey, which this year will be sent to non-members as well as to its current members. Following contact that I had with the AAPM in 2019, AAPM has offered to include questions in the survey from AAAPC about participating in research studies.
If you are interested, there is more information and a first draft of possible questions available via the Members only section of the website. Please send your suggestions for improvements and/or more useful questions to me as soon as possible.
Oliver Frank MBBS PhD FRACGP FACHI
The University of Adelaide
oliver.frank@adelaide.edu.au
Scholarships to the AAAPC Annual Research Conference
AAAPC is pleased to offer two competitive scholarships to support attendance of its members at the 2020 Annual Research Conference on the Gold Coast.
We are offering one Student scholarship and one scholarship to Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander of Australia or Māori and/or Pacific People of New Zealand. We invite you to have a look at the selection criteria on the conference website.
To apply, please tick the appropriate box when submitting your abstract online.
Welcome to New AAAPC Members
We warmly welcome all new members to AAAPC - if you would like your bio to be published in the monthly newsletter, please email aaapc.secretariat@anu.edu.au This is a great way to build networks within our community.
Winner of 2020 AAAPC Travelling Fellowship
Congratulations to Dr Michael Wright of University of Technology, Sydney
Michael will be travelling to the UK to visit the University of Manchester and other leading GP researchers “to investigate the establishment of primary care networks in the English National Health Service (NHS) and provide understanding about whether these structures are likely to reform delivery of UK general practice services, and whether they are applicable for Australia’s health system.”
We look forward to hearing from Michael about his findings when he returns - safe travels Michael!
AAAPC 2020 Annual Research Conference - call for abstracts
The call for abstracts for the AAAPC Annual Research Conference is now open, please circulate this opportunity to your colleagues and through your networks.
We are delighted to announce that the Australian Journal of Primary Health (AJPH) will be publishing an online supplement with the accepted abstracts from the Conference (see 2019 Issue).
Exciting new opportunity - AAAPC is pleased to offer two competitive scholarships to support attendance of its members at the 2020 Annual Research Conference on the Gold Coast.
Don’t miss out!
We warmly welcome all new members to AAAPC - if you would like your bio and photo to be published in the monthly newsletter, please email aaapc.secretariat@anu.edu.au This is a great way to build networks within our community.
The call for abstracts for the AAAPC 2020 Annual Research Conference is now open, closing on 15 March. Visit the ARC website, aaapc.org.au/ARC_abstracts to find out all the details.
Registration for the Conference is also available now. Prices and inclusions are listed on the registration page at aaapc.org.au/ARC_registration.
We look forward to seeing you on the Gold Coast in August!
New Australian primary care research opportunities announced
AAAPC members should be aware that the NHMRC has opened new research grant opportunities that will be of interest to many of our Australian members.
1. The Medical Research Future Fund - Preventive and Public Health Research Initiative - 2019 Preventive and Public Health Research Grant Opportunity will support research that focuses on one or more of the following priority areas:
2. The Medical Research Future Fund – Primary Health Care Research Initiative aims to enable or support an increase in Australia’s evidence base in primary health care through research to improve service delivery and patient outcomes, and to translate this knowledge into action.
The objective of this grant opportunity is to increase Australia’s evidence base in primary health care research for the following priority primary health care research topics:
3. The 2019 Rural, Regional and Remote Clinical Trial Enabling Infrastructure grant opportunity provides between $5 million and $100 million for new and innovative approaches to enhance and improve clinical trial infrastructure, to extend existing clinical trials into rural, regional and remote areas of Australia.
Further details are available on the GrantsConnect website www.grants.gov.au or via the NHMRC.
All opportunities have just been announced and are due either by the 5th of Feb or 3rd of March so if you haven’t already lets get collaborating and writing.
Best wishes
Kirsty Douglas (AAAPC President)
Results of the 2019 Extraordinary General Meeting
The AAAPC Executive Committee held an Extraordinary General Meeting earlier this week to vote on some constitutional changes. The meeting was well attended and the changes were passed. For further details please go to the website, where the minutes from the meeting are now available (or click the button below).
Minutes of the 2019 Extraordinary General Meeting
Call for Papers - Australian Journal of Primary Health
Calling all researchers who are looking at primary healthcare in an Ageing Society. A special issue of AJPH will be published in early 2021 so there is plenty of time to put forward your best work.
Details are available at: http://www.publish.csiro.au/py/content/CallforPapers
RACGP 2020 Academic Post Registrars attending 2020 Annual Research Conference
In December the newest cohort of Academic Post GP registrars took part in their orientation workshop before beginning a 12 month academic posting in February 2020. Twenty registrars were selected to the program with representation from six different states. In addition to the supervision, training and support academic registrars receive within their academic departments, they also participate in an activity program delivered by Monash University, Bond University and the University of Western Ontario (Canada).
The RACGP has confirmed that the registrars will attend the AAAPC Annual Research Conference in 2020 as an integral part of their academic and professional development. We wish the registrars well for the year and look forward to hearing about their research at the AAAPC 2020 Annual Research Conference on August 14-15 on the Gold Coast.
Happy Holidays!
We hope you all have a wonderful, safe, restful and joyful summer holiday. There will be no January AAAPC News, but we will be in touch again refreshed and ready for the new year in Feburary 2020.
Until then,
Dr Melinda Choy, AAAPC Editor
melinda.choy@anu.edu.au
AAAPC 2019 Extraordinary General Meeting
There will be an Extraordinary General Meeting held via teleconference at 8:00 am AEDT on 12 December 2019 to enable the membership to vote on constitutional changes.
To access the EGM documents and teleconference (Zoom) link, please log into the AAAPC site and click on the Members Only tab. Please send your queries and RSVPs (due by 5 December 2019) to aaapc.secretariat@anu.edu.au.
AAAPC Travelling Fellowship applications closing very soon
The AAAPC Travelling Fellowship provides up to $3000 for an AAAPC member for travel towards research and/or education in 2020. It is part of the AAAPC's aim to promote and develop primary care as a creative, cooperative and mutually supportive discipline.
Early career academics are strongly encouraged to apply. If you are interested in applying, please go to the website for further details. Applications close this week on November 30, 2019..
AAAPC Subcommittees finalised
Many thanks to all the enthusiastic members who put their hands up recently to join AAAPC Subcommittees. It is so exciting and promising to have such an active membership and we look forward to hearing more about each Subcommittee and what they are doing in the future.
A full list of the members of each Subcommittee is now available on our website.
Some members of the AAAPC Conference and Professional Development Subcommittee
Webinar updates for AAAPC members
Our webinar earlier this month, 'An Accidental Academic' with Professor Felicity Goodyear-Smith, was a great success with 21 attendees (17 from Australia, 4 from New Zealand, across a wide range of primary care disciplines) hearing a series of interesting stories and steps from Professor Goodyear-Smith's career. To find out more, visit the Webinars page on our website to watch the video.
Don't worry if you missed out, there will be plenty more opportunities next year. The Membership and Marketing Subcommittee is currently seeking nominations and requests for webinar topics for 2020. What are you interested in learning about? Whose story would you like to hear more of?
Please email your suggestions to aaapc.secretariat@anu.edu.au.
NAPCRG Annual Meeting
Congratulations again to Prof Grant Russell who presented 'Primary health care access for vulnerable communities: Uncovering the balance between supply and demand' as the 2019 AAAPC Distinguished Paper at the recent NAPCRG Annual Meeting in Toronto. The conference was a wonderful mix of disciplines, countries and research; expanding the horizons of primary care and seeking best possible care for patients.
Prof Grant Russell presents at NAPCRG 2019
Seeking expertise in Primary Care Educational Research
Do you have expertise in primary care educational research? Felicity Goodyear-Smith is co-editing a book on a practical guide to PHC educational research and is seeking authors for some of the chapters. If you are interested please can you complete the attached form below (titled 'Expertise in primary care research') and email it to Felicity at f.goodyear-smith@auckland.ac.nz.
Expertise in primary health care educational research.docx
Primary Health Care Reform Committee
We are glad to have had Dr Lauren Ball represent AAAPC at the Federal Government Primary Health Reform Committee Meeting on Monday November 25, where the Federal Government is developing the Australian Government Primary Health Care 10 Year Plan. Dr Ball is happy to receive input or questions from members between now and early 2020 when the plan will be finalised, and can be reached at l.ball@griffith.edu.au.
Request for course module writers
HealthCert is a Professional Education Provider currently seeking GP and/or academic writers for modules in the field of Women’s Health and Men’s Health. For further details or to express interest, please contact Christine Guyler via christine@healthcert.com.
We warmly welcome all new members to AAAPC - if you would like your bio to be published in the monthly newsletter, please email aaapc.secretariat@anu.edu.au. This is a great way to build networks within our community.
Until next month,
Register now for our upcoming webinar!
'An Accidental Academic' - November 2019
Now is the time to register for our upcoming webinar on Wednesday the 6th of November 11am-12pm AEST!
Professor Felicity Goodyear-Smith from the University of Auckland will be sharing some of her career journey and stories of co-design research projects involving Pacific people in South Auckland, Māori youth in Northland, and primary care researchers in low- and middle-income countries.
Professor Felicity Goodyear-Smith is Professor and Goodfellow Postgraduate Chair in the Department of General Practice & Primary Health Care, Faculty of Medical & Health Science at the University of Auckland. She is a general practitioner and also the founding Editor of the Journal for Primary Health Care. She has been blessed with being able to pursue a full and varied primary care research career over the past nearly two decades.
All primary health care researchers and teachers are welcome to attend. This will be the final AAAPC webinar for 2019.
Please register via the link below:
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about how to join the webinar.
Notice of Extraordinary General Meeting - December 2019
The AAAPC Executive Committee are calling an Extraordinary General Meeting at 8am-9am AEDT on December 12, 2019 to enable the membership to vote on constitutional changes.
To find out more and to view the relevant documents (constitution with proposed changes, table of changes, proxy form), please go to the relevant page on the website. Please note that the the EGM documents are only able to be viewed by AAAPC members.
To RSVP please email aaapc.secretariat@anu.edu.au by 5th December 2019.
Travelling Fellowship Applications Now Open
The AAAPC Travelling Fellowship provides up to $3000 for an AAAPC member for travel towards research and/or education in 2020. It is part of the AAAPC aim to promote and develop primary care as a creative, cooperative and mutually supportive discipline.
Early career academics are strongly encouraged to apply. If you are interested in applying, please go to the website for further details.
Applications close November 30, 2019.
Vale Professor Peter Mudge
Many of you will have heard the sad news that Emeritus Professor Peter Mudge passed away early in October. Professor Mudge was President of the Australian Association for Academic General Practice (as AAAPC was then known) for a number of years prior to 2000. Subsequent to that he was a lively contributor to the organisation’s meetings, and was always willing to help early career researchers.
Professor Mudge’s early research involved describing the epidemiology of Ross River Virus in the Riverland region, for which he was awarded the Faulding Prize for Research in 1982. His advisory work to the National Health and Medical Research Council contributed to 10 years of funding for primary health care research in Australia in the early part of the 2000s.
Professor Mudge's academic roles included: the University of Dundee, Flinders University (where he was awarded the title of Honorary Doctorate of Science, honoris causa), the University of Queensland (where he was later awarded the title of Emeritus Professor of General Practice) and Professor of General Practice at the University of Tasmania.
Throughout his academic career, Professor Mudge always made time to keep up his clinical work, despite busy teaching and research commitments, providing care to his patients and his local community as a general practitioner.
Professor Mudge was an inspirational leader within the RACGP, always raising the profile of general practice research. He served as chair of the College Council, Chair and Patron of the RACGP Foundation (which raises funds to support general practice research and education) and Chair of the RACGP National Research Awards Committee.
The RACGP went on to establish the Peter Mudge Medal to honour his work and commitment in general practice and primary care research. This national medal is awarded annually to the presenter at the RACGP Annual Conference whose original research has the most potential to significantly influence daily general practice in Australia. This is a fitting tribute to his work in raising the profile of research in primary care in Australia.
Professor Dimity Pond Professor of General Practice, University of Newcastle
We warmly welcome all new members to AAAPC - if you would like your bio to be published in the monthly newsletter, please email aaapc.secreteriat@anu.edu.au. This is a great way to build networks within our community.
Interested in joining a AAAPC Subcommittee?
The AAAPC has four subcommittees, including:
AAAPC is seeking to expand the membership of each of the subcommittees. More detail can be found on the website under the page AAAPC Subcommittees.
Hopefully you have already received an emailed link to a poll to express your interest in joining one of the AAAPC Subcommittees. If you are an AAAPC member and did not receive an email or did not yet look at the poll, please complete the poll here (You will need to sign in to see it). The poll will be open until the 1st of October.
A list of interested members will then be sent to the Chairs of the subcommittees, who will contact you to discuss further. We hope to include all members who volunteer, but also to ensure each subcommittee has a diverse range and practical number of members.
Huge NHMRC success for Primary Care Research!
Congratulations to the following AAAPC members who were successful in the first round of the National Health and Medical Research Council Investigator Grants. These are very prestigious awards and a wonderful recognition of hard work and research excellence;
Prof Paul Glasziou. Leader. Neglected problems in health care. $2,701,595.
Dr Lauren Ball. Emerging Leader 2. Capitalising on the potential of the primary care setting to facilitate healthy eating in the Australian population. $1,526,912.
Dr Liz Sturgiss. Emerging Leader 1. Enhancing primary healthcare for adults on low incomes with obesity - an intervention development study. $639,500.
Dr Geoff Spurling. Emerging Leader 1. Developing, implementing, and testing a co-created health assessment for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people in primary care. $366,925.
Upcoming NHMRC Opportunity for Primary Care Research
The Medical Research Future Fund has identified Primary Care Research as a priority area for funding for the upcoming NHMRC Investigator Grant round, for EL1 and EL2 applicants.
This is an exciting opportunity! Please read more here and consider applying.
Expressions of Interest for Hosting the 2021 AAAPC Annual Research Conference
The Conference Committee is seeking Expressions of Interest from University departments who are interested in hosting the 2021 AAAPC Conference. To host the AAAPC Conference, we require a suitable space, AV set up and the Department's ability to assist with onsite conference needs prior and during the event. The space needs to cater for at least 300 delegates, and include rooms for break-out sessions and plenaries. The conference budget does cover University space costs.
For further information or to express your interest, please email Liz Sturgiss (Chair Conference and Professional Development subcommittee, liz.sturgiss@monash.edu) by the end of October 2019.
AAAPC AGM Minutes
If you have not already noticed, the July 2019 AGM Minutes can be found on the AGM page of the website, as part of the 'Consolidated AAAPC 2019 AGM documents'.
In the future, verified minutes of the AAAPC Executive Committee Meetings will also be available on the website.
For new and newish members
Upcoming Webinar
We are looking forward to hearing Professor Felicity Goodyear-Smith from the University of Auckland speak at a webinar on Wednesday the 6th of November from 11am-12pm AEST.
The title is 'An accidental academic'. Professor Goodyear-Smith will share some of her career journey and stories of co-design research projects involving Pacific people in South Auckland, Māori youth in Northland, and primary care researchers in low- and middle-income countries.
All primary health care researchers and teachers are welcome to attend!
https://unimelb.zoom.us/webinar/register/a71a45ec157e565566858a512be5123a
AAAPC Subcommittees
AAAPC has four subcommittees:
If you are a member of AAAPC and interested in becoming more involved, joining one of the subcommittees is an excellent way to start. Brief descriptions of the subcommittees are available on the website.
Please stay posted over the next week for an email with instructions on how to express interest in joining a subcommittee.
NHRMC Peer Review Panel Self-Nominations closing (very) soon
NHMRC self-nominations for peer review are open until 28 August. Self-nominations are entirely acceptable and happen through the NHMRC Research Grants Management System.
All primary care researchers should be encouraged to self-nominate. It is a great learning opportunity and we need more primary care researchers to be involved.
Further details can be found here: https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/about-us/resources/nhmrc-peer-review-panels-guidance-self-nominations
Invitation to participate in NHMRC-funded development of a new guideline for stroke prevention
Calling those interested in participating in a multidisciplinary, multi-speciality formation of new guideline for stroke prevention for the International Union of Angiology. The focus will be on carotid artery disease with implications for all arterial disease prevention. The aim is to update the field and overcome procedural biases in existing guidelines. The project involves systematic reviews of guidelines and studies regarding how to best define and modify arterial disease risk factors (including hypertension, lipids, smoking etc) for primary and secondary prevention.
All work is done via email and variable time contributions are accommodated. For further information please email anne.abbott@monash.edu and see FACTCATS.org and https://research.monash.edu/en/persons/anne-abbott.
A/Prof Anne Abbott Neuroscience Department Central Clinical School Monash University
We warmly welcome all new members to AAAPC - if you would like your bio to be published in the monthly newsletter, please send it to aaapc.secretariat@anu.edu.au. This is a great way to build networks within our community.
