Kolling PRA MSK Showcase 2

Hosted by Gilbert Lorquet, CEO, NORTH Foundation on behalf of the Kolling Priority Research Area, Musculoskeletal, with presenters Professors Trudy Rebbeck, David Hunter, Michael Nicholas, Associate Professor Meilang Xue, Drs Tom Lynch and Jobe Shatrov.

A showcase of current musculoskeletal research, presented by researchers from Osteoarthritis Research, Suttons Arthritis, Pain Management Research Centre, A3BC Biobank, Murray Maxwell Biomechanics Lab and the John Walsh Centre for Rehabilitation Research. There will be an opportunity for discussion, light refreshments to follow.

Presenter bios:

Gilbert Lorquet

Gilbert leads the team and activities of the NORTH Foundation and is dedicated to significantly growing the Foundation so it can support more world class medical research and patient care services across the Northern Sydney Local Health District (NSLHD). Gil's role is to provide a clear sense of direction for the Foundation, with overall executive responsibility for fundraising and day to day operations. He has a background in philanthropy and brings a wealth of experience to lead the NORTH Foundation team. Outside work, Gil is the Chair of Football NSW and is passionate about football.

Professor Trudy Rebbeck

Trudy leads two national programmes of research; i) Implementation of clinical pathways and models of care for musculoskeletal (MSK) pain conditions and, ii) Discovery of new mechanism underpinning headache and MSK pain conditions . Her 5-year programme of research has attracted >$20m in competitive research funding including a recent MRFF Primary Care Grant to Implement Clinical PAthways of CarE in RURAL regions (PACE-RURAL); $2.5m 2024-2029). She has 85+ publications and >2800 citations. Professor Rebbeck has supervised 16 HDR students and mentored over 50 clinical specialists in physiotherapy to obtain Fellowship. Her current role is to mentor AH clinicians in NSLHD to build research capacity. Trudy’s international impact in clinical translation is demonstrated by the 10+ international workshops she delivers in this area per annum.

Dr Tom Lynch

Tom is a senior project officer with the Australian Arthritis and Autoimmune Biobank Collaborative (A3BC) and the NHMRC Centre of Research Excellence for Better Outcomes in Inflammatory Arthritis. He has a background in clinical medicine, the medical sciences, laboratory-based human tissue research, biomedical engineering and clinical trials, and is a PhD candidate in the University of Sydney Faculty of Medicine and Health. His current research focuses on personalised medicine for inflammatory arthritis, and he works with the A3BC network to deliver on the ambitious vision of a national, data-linked biobank-registry for large-scale arthritis and autoimmune disease research.

Dr Jobe Shatrov

Jobe completed his medical degree at the University of Notre Dame, Australia in 2011 being awarded Dux in his final year of studies. Dr Shatrov completed training in orthopaedic surgery in NSW, Australia in February 2019 and was subsequently inducted into the Royal Australian College of Surgeons. Since completion, he has worked in multiple hospitals in NSW as a locum orthopaedic trauma surgeon and developed his passion for teaching and research. Prior to departing for international fellowship, he was appointed to Hornsby and Kur-ring-gai Hospital in Sydney as an Orthopaedic visiting medical officer. In 2021 and 2022 he completed three international knee fellowships in Lyon, France. The first being at La Croix Hospital focusing on knee arthroplasty, revision knee arthroplasty, robotic-knee surgery and complex knee surgery such as extensor mechanism reconstructions and replacement. The second was at the SANTY clinic, focusing on sports medicine of the knee where he undertook training learning new surgical techniques in ACL surgery. The final fellowship was at the prestigious Fortius clinic, London under the mentorship of Mr. Andy Williams and Mr. Simon Ball focusing on sports knee surgery.

Jobe lectures for the University of Sydney Master of Surgery program and medical students at the University of Notre Dame Australia and continues to be involved in teaching of orthopaedic trainees for the Australian Orthopaedic Association.

Professor David Hunter

David is a rheumatologist clinician-researcher whose primary research focus is clinical and translational research in osteoarthritis. He is ranked as the leading expert in the world on osteoarthritis on expertscape.com, is the section editor for UpToDate osteoarthritis, the Editor in Chief for Osteoarthritis and Cartilage, host of the Joint Action podcast, and has over 700 publications in peer-reviewed journals. He leads the osteoarthritis team at the Kolling Institute, which is dedicated to improving our understanding of osteoarthritis and the quality of life for those who suffer from this prevalent disabling disease.

Professor Michael Nicholas

Michael is a Clinical Psychologist and since 1994 has worked at the Pain Management and Research Centre, RNSH, where he has clinical, research and teaching roles, as well as directing multidisciplinary pain management programs. He has a conjoint appointment with the Sydney Medical School (Northern), University of Sydney. Part of this role includes directing the Post-Graduate Pain Education unit which provides online degree and continuing education courses for all health disciplines across Australia and internationally.

Michael’s research and educational work has also been recognised internationally by the International Association for the Study of PAIN (IASP), and is reflected in his contributions to the development of the 11th edition of the WHO’s International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) on Chronic Pain Diagnoses, and, more recently, to the 2022 The Low Back Pain Clinical Care Standard for The Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care.

Associate Professor Xue

Meilang is the head of Sutton Arthritis Research Laboratory at the Kolling Institute, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney. Her research focuses on defining the molecular and cellular mechanisms of inflammatory/autoimmune diseases and research finding translation. She has been ranked as the 12th world-leading expert in her research field from 2013 to 2023.