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The Australian and New Zealand Children’s Haematology/Oncology Group (ANZCHOG) Annual Scientific Meeting (ASM) 2021 is being held virtually from 23rd June to 25th June 2021.
Recognised as the leading scientific meeting for paediatric oncology in Australia and New Zealand, the ANZCHOG ASM 2021 will bring together paediatric oncologists haematologists, nurses, allied and mental health professionals, research scientists, clinical research professionals, parents and consumers, to discuss the latest developments in research and treatment.
This year’s theme is: “Clinical decision-making in a time of precision, hope and uncertainty.”
This broad theme will encompass the increasingly complex decision-making needed as precision medicine and advanced genomics/epigenomics expands at a breath-taking pace, and our need to be mindful of the hope and uncertainty this creates for families and clinicians. It includes challenging clinical and ethical decision-making related to relapsed disease, difficult-to-treat cancers, and end-of-life care.
The theme embraces the breadth of clinical decision-making across medical, nursing, psychosocial and allied health staff and the contributions families make in shared decision-making processes.
ASM sessions will include precision medicine; survivorship; palliative care; ethics and drug access and cancer treatment in developing countries.
The Annual Scientific Meeting 2021 Virtual registration is now available . Click below for more information.
Exciting opportunities to engage with more colleagues than ever before
Don’t miss any parallel talks or engaging Q&A sessions
1 month access to all program content and materials to review at your leisure
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Daniel Lantsberg, MD, MHA, is currently a Reproductive Endocrinology Fellow at the Royal Women’s Hospital and a member of the fertility preservation Task force at the Royal Children’s Hospital.
Completed his Medical Degree Cum Laude (2008) at Ben Gurion University of Beer Sheva, Israel and his Masters of Health Administration in the same university. He completed his Obstetrics & Gynaecology training at Sheba Medical centre and completed his certification with Honors.
In Israel served as the clinical Director of outpatient Obstetrics & Gynaecology Emergency Care centres at Maccabi Healthcare and a consultant in the infertility institute, Tel Aviv Medical centre.
Maddie Gilsenan is the Bone Marrow Transplant (BMT) & Cellular Therapies Nurse Practitioner at The Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH), Melbourne. She was previously involved in the ELIANA CAR T cell trial conducted at the RCH, in her role as BMT Research Nurse Coordinator from 2016-2019, and has been involved in the implementation of the first Australian paediatric Kymriah program, at RCH Melbourne.
Sarah Grimshaw is a physiotherapist currently undertaking her PhD through the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and La Trobe University. Her PhD is investigating novel ways to improve activity levels and reduce sedentary behaviours for children undergoing acute cancer treatment.
Sarah worked for many years as the senior physiotherapist to oncology at the Royal Children’s Hospital, is chair of the research advisory council for the charity “Little Big Steps” and tutors for the Masters of Physiotherapy degree at La Trobe University.
Associate Professor Gabrielle Haeusler is a paediatrician and infectious diseases physician The Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and The Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne. She is also a post-doctoral researcher with the National Centre for Infections in Cancer (NCIC) and Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI).
Gabrielle’s program of research focuses on optimising infection prevention and management in children with cancer and she is currently leading a national paediatric study to implement a low-risk febrile neutropenia program across eight tertiary paediatric cancer centres in Australia.
Hannah Walker is in her second year of an oncology fellowship at The Royal Children’s Hospital. Hannah completed her medical degree at The University of Wollongong where she was awarded The University Medal. Hannah is interested in research that can be translated into clinical practice at a local level.
Hannah is currently undertaking a research project looking at the management of non-neutropenic fever in a large cohort of patients in Victoria with the aim of establishing a guideline for their management. Hannah is a committee member in the Young Investigator SIOP group.
A/Prof Hansford is an oncologist, focusing his practice in neuro-oncology at RCH Melbourne. He has a keen interest in clinical trials, genomics/epigenomics and their integration into standard practice.
Evangeline Jackson completed her degree in Biomedical Science in 2018 and is a currently a PhD candidate in the Cancer Signalling Research Group of Dr Matthew Dun.
Evangeline’s project investigates the novel therapeutic ONC201 for treatment of diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) in particular, mechanistic studies to improve treatment response utilising combination treatment paradigms.
AProfessor Yasmin Jayasinghe (FRANZCOG, PhD) is a paediatric gynaecologist, past NHMRC translational fellow and Winter Glover Senior Research Fellow. Her research at the Mayo clinic contributed to guidance for breast masses for the AAP. She has examined virology and risk factors for cervical cancer in young women leading to HPV vaccination and screening guidelines. She Chairs the Fertility Preservation (FP) Service at The RCH, the FP Taskforce (Vic) and the ANZ Paediatric Oncofertility Consortium and is in the leadership of the Global Oncofertility Consortium. Recently she was awarded The University of Melbourne’s Strategic Grant for Outstanding Women (2019), was a finalist in the Telstra Womens Business Awards (2020), and VicHealth awards for Transforming Fertility care in children with cancer (2019).
Dr Smadar Kahana-Edwin is a molecular biologist and a cancer researcher with specific training and expertise in translational cancer research. She is working at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead with A/Prof Karpelowsky since 2017 to develop blood tests for monitoring the presence of circulating tumour material in patients’ blood. She has special interest in developing improved minimally invasive approaches for cancer detection and diagnosis.
Lei Shong Lau co-founded the newly established ANZ Consortium in Oncofertility (ANZCO) with ANZCHOG clinicians, ANZ Oncofertility experts and consumers. She is currently program manager for ANZCO. She is on The RCH Fertility Preservation (FP) Steering Committee which developed and implemented Australia’s first governed paediatric FP model of care. She undertook research training in immunology and cellular and molecular biology at The University of Melbourne, The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research and St Vincent’s Institute.
She has also previously held several professional roles in the areas of research ethics and governance, academic governance, project management, and policy development and implementation. Her current research interest is in reproductive health and oncofertility research.
Zac graduated with a Bachelor of Biomedical Science (Hons) in 2017 and is currently in the final year of his PhD at the University of Newcastle. Zac’s work is focused on using proteomics to understand cell signalling in acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) in order to identify novel drug targets. Currently, his work is revealing the clinical relevance of targeting reactive oxygen species production for the treatment of AML.
Dr Loretta Lau is paediatric oncologist at Sydney Children’s Hospital and Conjoint Senior Lecturer at the School of Women’s and Children’s, UNSW. As a molecular oncologist in the ZERO program at Children’s Cancer Institute, she provides precision medicine expertise to ZERO and plays an instrumental role in Australia’s first national personalized medicine trial for high-risk childhood cancers (PRISM trial). She is passionate about education in molecular oncology and provides training to oncology fellows in paediatric precision oncology.
Rachael is an oncology pharmacist from the Queensland Children’s Hospital who has a special interest in haematopoietic stem cell transplantation. She is currently in her final year of PhD studies investigating the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of intravenous once daily busulfan in children.
Dr Vajiranee (Rani) Malalasekera is a paediatric oncologist who is currently undertaking a translational PhD investigating novel targeted therapies for paediatric acute myeloid leukaemia with the Leukaemia Translational Research Group at the Australian Centre for Blood Diseases. Dr Malalasekera completed her medical degree at The University of Melbourne in 2010 and completed her Paediatric Oncology training at The Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne.
In 2020, she also worked at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre as an Adolescent and Young Adult Medical Oncology Fellow. She has a specific interest in haematological malignancies and bone marrow transplantation.
Dr Barbara McClure is an Early Career Researcher and her currently appointment is Post-Doctoral Researcher in the Leukaemia Research Group in the Cancer program, Precision Medicine Theme at SAHMRI. She has significant research experience in the molecular and cellular biology and the genomics of acute leukaemia which has led to 42 peer reviewed publications.
In 2019 Dr McClure was named an AMP Tomorrow Maker. Barbara actively engages within the community as a CSIRO STEM Professional in Schools Volunteer.
Alexandria McGrath is a Senior Clinical Trials Pharmacist at Queensland Children’s Hospital. She completed her project while undertaking her Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia Residency Program project.
Hien Nguyen is a Master of Clinical Psychology student at the Swinburne University of Technology and a registered psychologist. She had a special interest in adolescent and young adult mental health, and has worked in various private and public services providing clinical services to this age group.
She is currently the Student Researcher and Investigator in a joint AYA oncology study between Swinburne University of Technology and Monash Health, and assisted with the overall planning and development of the project. She led the participant focus groups/interviews and contributed to the data analysis process.
Claire Radford works Queensland Children’s Hospital (QCH) across several roles – Senior Speech Pathologist, Allied Health Clinical Lead (oncology) and Allied Health Educator (palliative care). With 15 years’ experience in tertiary paediatric healthcare, Claire has specialised in paediatric oncology, palliative care and rehabilitation. Claire has also held a number of clinical leadership and project positions within the oncology and palliative care services at QCH, and is a regular guest-lecturer in palliative care for speech pathology courses at The University of Queensland and Southern Cross University.
Jacqueline is a PhD candidate with the University of Adelaide specialising in clinical genomics and bioinformatics. Her research focuses on the development of bioinformatics tools for improved detection of genomic alterations from high-throughput sequencing data.
Jacqueline is also a member of the Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia research group at SAHMRI, where she applies her bioinformatic skills to the analysis of RNA-seq data to detect disease-causing variants in patient samples. In these dual roles, she has published a review paper on DUX4-rearranged ALL and contributed to the publication of 2 research papers and 5 conference abstracts.
Dr Kirsty Ross is a registered Senior Clinical Psychologist, and Senior Lecturer in Clinical Psychology at Massey University Palmerston North, where she is also part of the leadership team for the Psychology Clinic. Dr Ross has worked with children for 20 years. For the past 15 years, she has practiced at the Psychology Clinic, specializing in working with youth and families/whānau managing long term/terminal health conditions, particularly cancer, as well as anxiety and trauma. Dr Ross also works in the community to enhance existing strengths, prevent serious forms of mental distress, and foster mental health and wellbeing. She is currently training therapists to establish a child cancer counseling network across NZ/Aotearoa for children with cancer, and their families.
Dr. Emmy Fleuren is a Senior Scientist with >10 years of internationally-recognised expertise and a solid track-record in translational sarcoma research. She was awarded her PhD cum laude at Radboud University, the Netherlands, and performed postdoctoral research at the Institute of Cancer Research, London, and Monash University, Melbourne. In 2019, she joined Children’s Cancer Institute and the ZERO Childhood Cancer Program to lead the Sarcoma Research.
Dr Fleuren further holds a Conjoint Senior Lecturer appointment at the University of New South Wales and received various prestigious awards throughout her career, including a Cancer Institute NSW Early Career Fellowship and a Rubicon Fellowship. Her work was selected or invited for oral presentations at several prestigious meetings throughout her career.
Dr Sandra Staffieri is a Clinical and Research Orthoptist with over 35 years experience working at the Royal Children’s Hospital, Victoria. She developed the unique role of Retinoblastoma Care Co-ordinator for the Department of Ophthalmology and is affiliated with the Centre for Eye Research Australia, the MCRI, and the University of Melbourne. Sandra is active in retinoblastoma research with a focus on raising awareness of early signs of the disease, translation of genetic testing for familial or heritable retinoblastoma and long-term survivorship.
To improve timely diagnosis of retinoblastoma, supported by an NHMRC Post-graduate scholarship, her doctoral study developed and evaluated a sustainable education program for new parents to raise awareness of the early signs of paediatric eye disease.
Eden is a second-year advanced trainee in paediatric medical oncology at the Children’s Cancer Centre, Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH), Melbourne. She completed her MBBS at the University of Melbourne and is in the final stages of a Masters of Public Health through James Cook University. Working within the leukaemia and bone marrow transplant streams during 2020 inspired Eden to pursue various research opportunities, which complemented a longstanding clinical and research interest in infectious diseases affecting immunocompromised patients.
One of Eden’s current projects involves exploring patterns of infection and antibiotic use among HSCT patients to help inform clinical practice guidelines at RCH.
bio
Vijay is originally from Northern Alberta and completed his MD (2005) and Child Neurology Residency (2010) at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta. He then completed a Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Fellowship at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, and proceeded to return to Canada where he completed his PhD in Cancer Genomics at the University of Toronto under the supervision of Dr. Michael Taylor.
He is currently a Staff Neuro-Oncologist at the Hospital for Sick Children, Principal Investigator in the Arthur and Sonia Labatt Brain Tumour Research Centre, and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medical Biophysics at the University of Toronto. His research works have focused on the genomics of medulloblastoma and ependymoma, with a specific interest in recurrent disease. His laboratory is focused on improving classification and identification of novel therapies for recurrent ependymoma and medulloblastoma.
Dr. Mabbott received his PhD in developmental psychology at the University of Alberta in 1998 and then completed a post-doctoral fellowship in paediatric neuropsychology at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids).
Dr. Mabbott is Head of Neurosciences and Mental Health Program and Senior Scientist within the Research Institute at SickKids and a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Toronto. Situated at the intersection between clinical neuroscience, developmental neuropsychology, and regenerative medicine, Dr. Mabbott’s research program seeks to: (a) understand how perturbed brain development manifests as cognitive impairment in children – particularly in survivors of paediatric brain tumours, and (b) discover how neuroplasticity in the developing brain can be harnessed for neural recovery and cognitive restoration in children with acquired brain injury. His work has been instrumental in documenting the thinking and learning problems children and adolescents treated for brain tumours experience, and the underlying damage to brain structure and function that cause these problems.
He is now conducting exciting new work to find ways to foster brain repair and cognitive recovery following acquired brain injury in children, including harnessing neuroplasticity from physical exercise and employing drugs that stimulate the growth of new brain cells.
Martha Grootenhuis is head of the Psycho-oncology team at the Princess Máxima Center in the Netherlands. As principal investigator she leads a research group focused on psychosocial aspects of cancer treatment of children, and family members. These include consequences such as medical traumatic stress, anxiety and depression, but also quality of life and sleep. Her group focuses on the early recognition and treatment of these problems, using innovatiove web-based applications for monitoring and screening, and for group interventions. Effectiveness research and implementation of interventions are part of the research program. She is professor of Pediatric Psycho-Oncology at Utrecht University. She is founder and chairperson of the Pediatric Psycho-Oncology Committee of the International Society of Pediatric Oncology (SIOP).
Lynn Gillam is an experienced clinical ethicist, originally trained in philosophy (MA, Oxon, as a Rhodes Scholar) and bioethics (PhD). Lynn is the Academic Director of the Children’s Bioethics Centre at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne. She is also Professor in Health Ethics at the University of Melbourne, in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health.
Lynn provides clinical ethics case consultation, policy advice and leads research in paediatric clinical ethics. In 2018, Lynn was awarded the RCH Chairman’s Medal, in recognition of this work.
She also teaches ethics in the MD course, and supervises research students.
A/Prof Maria McCarthy is a Senior Mental Health Clinician in the Children’s Cancer Centre (CCC) at the Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne and leads a team of clinicians who provide psychosocial support to children who are being treated for cancer and other haematological conditions, and their families.
As a clinician-scientist, Maria also holds positions as a Senior Research Fellow with the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and an Honorary Principal Fellow with the University of Melbourne Department of Paediatrics. In these roles Maria oversees clinical trials, and leads both quality of life and intervention research with a specific focus on translating findings into clinical initiatives. This has resulted in a comprehensive suite of clinical programs which aim to optimise psychological, educational and social outcomes for children and their families who are treated for serious illnesses through the CCC.
Dr. Patrick Brown is Professor of Oncology and Pediatrics and Director of the Pediatric Leukemia Program at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore. He is the Vice Chair for relapse and an executive steering committee member of the ALL Committee in the Children’s Oncology Group, and chairs the National Comprehensive Cancer Network’s Clinical Guidelines Panels for adult and pediatric ALL. His research focuses on developing molecularly targeted therapies for high risk childhood leukemias.
Nigel is currently employed as the Principal Research Radiation Therapist in Melbourne.
He completed his PhD at Monash University in 2019, and enjoys working to bring novel concepts into radiotherapy clinical practice.
Fiona Barton is a paediatric physiotherapist at Monash Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia.
She was an associative investigator for the FITChild study with the Children’s Cancer Center. She is passionate about maintaining and promoting physical activity for children undergoing treatment for cancer and thus the role physio plays in maintaining levels of independence and fun. She is currently responsible for the care of CNS tumour patients at Monash Children’s Hospital.
Izac Findlay graduated a Bachelor of Biotechnology with Distinction at the University of Newcastle in 2020. Following a summer scholarship, Izac is now completing a Bachelor of Biomedical Science (Honours) under the supervision of Associate Professor Matt Dun. Utilising a bioinformatics approach, Izac’s current work seeks to characterise the functional genomics of diffuse midline glioma, in collaboration with A/Prof Mark Cowley, Dr Sebastian Waszak and A/Prof Michelle Monje.
Dr Kanika Bhatia is a paediatric oncologist at the Children’s Cancer Centre in the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH), Melbourne. Her major clinical and research interests are in solid and brain tumours, paediatric cancer genetics as well as palliative and supportive care. She is the clinical lead for a multi-disciplinary paediatric cancer genetics program in the RCH and is the co-chair for the EviQ paediatric cancer genetics committee.
Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Centre, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Coen is a General Paediatrician and Paediatric Infectious Diseases Physician. After completing a medical degree at the University of Newcastle in 2011, he undertook paediatric training in Melbourne at The Royal Children’s and Monash Children’s Hospitals.
He also spent time working and teaching in the Solomon Islands. Coen has a specific interest in improving supportive care for children with cancer and is completing a PhD examining the use of antibiotics in children with high-risk febrile neutropenia.
Dr Jennifer Chard is a Radiation Oncologist with expertise in the management of paediatric, AYA and gynaecological cancers. She leads the brachytherapy program at Westmead Hospital.
Rebecca Daly is a research assistant at the Behavioural Sciences Unit, UNSW. She works on ethics and genetics projects primarily the psychosocial substudy that runs alongside the PRecISion Medicine for Children with Cancer (PRISM) trial, Australia’s first precision medicine trial for children with high-risk cancer. Before joining the BSU Rebecca worked in the disability sector supporting adults and children in the community and residential settings, as a case manager, and as a research assistant for The Successful Ageing in Intellectual Disability (SAge-ID) Study at UNSW.
Dr Ryan Duchatel is an early career researcher in the Cancer Signalling Research Group of Dr Matthew Dun.
Dr Duchatel’s current research project focuses on targeting the PI3K signalling axis for treatment of Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma, and how inhibition of this core signalling pathway can lead to strong combination therapies with other clinically relevant treatment strategies.
A/Prof Matt Dun received his PhD from the University of Newcastle in 2012. He has been decorated by >25 national and international awards, including the 2019 NSW Premier’s Awards for Outstanding Cancer Research Fellow and a Young Tall Poppy Award in 2020. A/Prof Dun has secured successive Cancer Institute NSW Early Career Fellowships (2014-2016 and 2017-2019), an NHMRC Investigator Grant (2020-2025), a Defeat DIPG Chadtough New Investigator Grant (2020-2021) and successful Cancer Institute NSW and NHMRC Equipment Grants to establish a high-resolution mass spectrometry platform at the University of Newcastle.
A/Prof Dun guides the Cancer Signalling Research Group at the University of Newcastle and the Hunter Medical Research Institute, which focuses on paediatric leukaemia, and brain cancer research. His group employs sophisticated pharmaco-phospho-proteo-genomics techniques to characterise the cellular signalling pathways dysregulated by the genetic individualities of a patient’s cancer. This profiling strategy attempts to identify novel treatment targets and drug combinations to improve survival.
Dr Laura Eadie is an award-winning biomedical researcher and the current Peter Nelson Leukaemia Research Fellow. She is a previous Fulbright scholar, a TEDx speaker and science communicator.
Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) is an extremely heterogeneous disease with subtypes of patients exhibiting a diverse range of genetic mutations. Dr Eadie leads in vivo mouse studies for high-risk ALL with a specific focus on T-cell ALL within the South Australian Health & Medical Research Institute’s ALL Research Group. Laura’s research seeks to pave the way for alternative T-ALL therapies that are more effective and have fewer long-term side effects. She is using cutting edge laboratory models to evaluate precision medicine treatment strategies tailored to individual patients.
Rachel Edwards is a Paediatric Oncology Nurse Educator at Queensland Children’s Hospital with over 25 years’ experience caring for people with cancer. She joined the eviQ Education team as a subject matter expert in 2020 and is leading the content review of the national Paediatric Antineoplastic Drug Administration Course. In these roles, Rachel provides educational leadership, develops curriculum, and facilitates training programs.
Assoc. Prof. David Elliott completed his PhD on the genetics of heart development at The Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute and completed a post-doc at Cambridge University. In 2013 David started his laboratory at the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute. The focus of laboratory is to investigate the genetic control of early human heart development and develop pluripotent stem cell based models of heart disease. David’s laboratory has identified novel pathogenic variants that underlie cardiomyopathy and key transcriptional networks regulating heart development. David established and co-directs the Australian Cardio-Oncology Registry (ACOR), a national program targeted at improving long-term cardiac health outcomes for childhood cancer survivors. ACOR facilitates a functional pharmacogenomics stem cell-based studied aimed at understanding the genetic basis of chemotherapy induced heart disease.
Dr Ursula Sansom-Daly is a Senior Research Fellow at the School of Women’s and Children’s Health, UNSW Medicine, University of New South Wales (UNSW) Sydney, Australia. Ursula is also the Clinical Psychologist for Sydney Youth Cancer Service, a leading team in the treatment and clinical care of adolescents and young adults aged 15-25 years with cancer in Sydney. Reflecting her dual clinical-research roles, Ursula focuses on applying evidence-based psychological models and methods to understand, and address, the mental health implications of cancer among adolescents and young adults with cancer. Her research spans the cancer trajectory, from diagnosis through to survivorship and end-of-life.
Professor Michael Sullivan is a Paediatric Oncologist/Neuro-Oncologist at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne and Professor of Paediatrics at the University of Melbourne. He is Continental President of SIOP Oceania and Co-Chair of SIOP Global Health (formerly PODC). He is the official SIOP liaison to the WHO for the Global initiative for Childhood Cancer and co-leader of the SIOP, IPSO, PROS and St Jude Global ARIA collaboration.
Mei Ling has been working as a paediatric oncology nurse for almost 20 years. Her focus has been on integrating the delivery of best evidenced based nursing practice and patient-family centred care as part of her nursing care duties. Mei Ling is passionate in working in paediatric oncology and palliative care; especially in the treatment and nursing management of haemopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT). She believes that patient-family centred care can be enhanced by giving due consideration to variation in cultural dynamics that differentiate in sensitivity and understanding. Sympathising with individuals to improve care should be made a vital part of our healthcare system. Mei Ling promotes awareness of cultural diversity given her experience in working with patients and families from diverse multicultural backgrounds from around the globe and her own background as a Taiwanese-Australian. Mei Ling is currently working at the Children Cancer Centre in Royal Childrens Hospital Melbourne and Maddie Riewoldt’s Vision.
Matt is a paediatric oncologist at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital in Adelaide. He completed his international fellowship at Birmingham Children’s Hospital UK.
Dr Sue Heatley gained her PhD in Transplant Immunology from the University of Melbourne. She was awarded a New Investigator Scholarship by the Haematology Society of Australia & New Zealand (HSANZ) to undertake a visiting fellow position in the laboratory of Prof Charles Mullighan at the St Judes Childrens Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, USA. In 2013, Sue began her current position at the South Australian Health & Medical Research Institute as a Research Fellow in the Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia Research group of Prof Deb White in the Cancer Program and is the current Kids Cancer Project Postdoctoral Fellow. Her current research interests are focussed on the genomic landscape of ALL and improving patient outcome through personalised medicine.
Dr Lisa Orme has been a consultant Paediatric Haematologist Oncologist in the Children’s Cancer Centre at The Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne since 2003. She has also held a position as an Adolescent and Young Adult Oncologist with The ONTrac at PeterMac Victorian Adolescent Young Adult Cancer Service and The VCCC Sarcoma Service since November 2007.
Dr Orme completed her medical degree at the University of Melbourne and paediatric training at The Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne. She completed a Fellowship in Paediatric Haematology/Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre.
Dr Orme’s interests and involvement include: sarcomas in young people, adolescent and young adult oncology, oncofertility and survivorship.
Dr Luciano Dalla-Pozza is Department Head, a Senior Staff Specialist and Director of the Cancer Centre for Children at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead (SCHN). A practicing paediatric oncologist since 1985, he has extensive experience in child cancer clinical trials
Dr Chris Fraser is a paediatric oncologist at the Queensland Children’s Hospital in Brisbane. He has been a member of the ANZCHOG Executive Committee since 2010 and the Chair of the Committee since 2014. Dr Fraser completed his paediatric oncology training at the Royal Children’s Hospital (Melbourne) between 2001-2004 before travelling to the University of Minnesota (Minneapolis, USA) to complete a fellowship in paediatric bone marrow transplantation, and then returned to Royal Children’s Hospital (Melbourne) as a consultant oncologist in 2006. In 2008, he took up a role as the Director of the Blood and Marrow Transplant Program at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane and has continued that role since the move of Brisbane paediatric oncology services to the Lady Cilento Children’s Hospital in November 2014. He has served as the Chair of the ANZCHOG BMT sub-group and on numerous other national and international committees in the fields of paediatric oncology and bone marrow transplantation.
Siobhan Cross is a paediatric haematologist who trained in New Zealand, England and Australia before taking up a position in Christchurch. she has published in the use of PET scans in paediatric cancer, familial cancer syndromes, enrollment barriers in clinical trials and cancer registries. She is a member of the Children’s Oncology Group cancer control steering committee and current chair of the ANZCHOG leukaemia subgroup. Her current research interests are in post treatment immunisations and pharmacogenetic differences in drug metabolism in anti-leukaemic therapy.
Grace is a Pharmacist at Monash Health and has worked in a variety of areas including compounding services for paediatric oncology patients.
Andrea has been a registered nurse and midwife for over 35 yrs. She first specialised in IVF in 1999. She joined Royal Women’s Hospital, Melbourne in 2019 to establish the National Ovarian and Testicular Tissue Transport and Cryopreservation Service (NOTTCS)
Paediatric oncologist at Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network, Westmead.
Perla has been based at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead since she began her paediatric training in 2013. She is currently a paediatric Advanced Trainee with the Royal Australasian College of Physicians dual training in Medical Oncology and Clinical Haematology.
Jenna is completing her advanced training in both Oncology and General Paediatrics. She is currently working at the Queensland Childrens Hospital in Brisbane.
Dr Natacha Omer is a paediatric oncologist at the Queensland Childrens Hospital with a special interest in sarcoma. She is also an active researcher in cancer immunotherapy at the University of Queensland Diamantina Institute where she is developing a novel NK cell-based immunotherapy for paediatric sarcomas patients as her PhD project.
Sophie is a fellow at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital in Adelaide. She received her FRACP in Paediatric Oncology in May 2021. Her research interests include leukaemia presentation patterns amongst different ethnicities and areas of remoteness, Langerhans cell histiocytosis and NUDT15 polymorphisms in children with ALL. She also has interests in palliative care (MD), solid tumours and late effects/long term follow up.
Noemi Fuentes, M.D., Ph.D., is a postdoctoral clinical research fellow originally from Spain. After receiving her medical degree, she completed a Masters of Sciences in Biomedicine before undertaking a PhD in Epidemiology in 2017. In addition, Noemi completed international fellowships in Paediatric Oncology in Spain, the United Kingdom (The Royal Marsden Hospital) and Australia (Sydney Children’s Hospital). She has further sub-specialised by undertaking two years of training in Hereditary Cancer Genetics. Noemi’s primary research interest is in cancer predisposition syndromes in children and the adolescent and young adult (AYA) population. She joined the national ZERO Childhood Cancer Program (Australia) in 2019 as a Cancer Predisposition Research Fellow. Noemi is involved in the development of a number of national clinical guidelines for the surveillance of children with cancer predisposition syndromes.
Elyse is a post-graduate researcher with the Leukaemia Research Group at SAHMRI. She graduated from the University of Adelaide in 2016 with a Bachelor of Science (Advanced) and began her Master of Philosophy in 2017 which was upgraded to a PhD with a highly competitive Upgrade Scholarship. She recently submitted her thesis on Precision Medicine in Down Syndrome Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia. During her PhD, Elyse published 2 papers and 2 conference abstracts and has recently submitted an additional 2 research articles for publication. She has presented her PhD research at over 15 conferences and received awards for oral presentations including winning the Adelaide University Biological Sciences 3MT Competition.
Priscilla Pek (MMthpy, B Arts Hons.) is a Melbourne-based Registered Music Therapist who has worked at Monash Children’s Hospital, Monash Health since 2012. She has extensive experience working within the acute medical model in public health, having started as a new graduate in General Paediatrics. Priscilla currently works full-time across Adolescent Medicine, Adolescent Mental Health (ELMHS) and Paediatric Oncology.
Priscilla is passionate about the use of music to improve the coping and health outcomes of adolescents experiencing medical or mental health challenges. In the context of our new COVID world where coping strategies are limited, this passion remains very much alive as she believes music can have an important role in maintaining connectedness, facilitate coping, and create opportunities for mindfulness.
Dr Madeleine Powys is a paediatric oncologist who is currently completing a two-year, post-graduate, clinical BMT fellowship at The Children’s Hospital at Westmead (CHW). Madeleine is a dedicated clinician and early career researcher who is passionate about working collaboratively to provide best-practice care to patients and families. Her interests include high-risk leukaemia and lymphoma, transplant for malignant and non-malignant disease and emerging cellular therapies. Madeleine is the Chair of the CHW Complex Leukaemia Meeting and a member of the ANZCHOG TACTIC (BMT) Group and ASCIA TAPID (Transplantation and PID) Project. Madeleine is a strong advocate for improving quality and safety, an enthusiastic supervisor of RACP trainees and a regular contributor to nursing and medical education.
Clarissa Schilstra holds a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Duke University, in the US, and is currently a PhD Candidate in the School of Womens and Childrens Health, Faculty of Medicine, UNSW Sydney. Clarissa works as a Research Assistant in the Behavioural Sciences Unit at the Kids Cancer Centre, Sydney Childrens Hospital, to coordinate the Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia Sub-Types and Side Effects from Treatment (ASSET) Health-Related Quality of Life Sub-Study. ASSET is a prospective, international registry study for children with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia across Australia and New Zealand.
Dr Senapati completed her medical training at the University of Sydney and completed her basic paediatric training at John Hunter Childrens Hospital. She specialised in paediatric haematology and oncology by undertaking a haematology/oncology fellowship at John Hunter Childrens Hospital. Dr Senapati has also completed a neuro-oncology and precision medicine (PRISM) fellowship at Sydney Children’s Hospital, a role in which she continues to be employed. Her areas of interest include neuro-oncology, the clinical application of precision medicine and palliative care and symptom management in the oncology setting
Dr Toofanian completed her medical training at Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry (MBBS) in the United Kingdom. After relocating to Australia, she undertook her paediatric training and Haematology Oncology fellowship at Sydney Children’s Hospital with an additional fellowship in Bone Marrow Transplantation and Cellular Therapy. Her interests include malignant haematology, inherited bone marrow failure syndromes and bone marrow transplantation.
Kate Vandenberg RN, MN is currently working in the position of Paediatric Oncology Nurse Practitioner at the Children’s Cancer Centre – Monash Children’s.
The NP role provides care in the outpatient setting to children with cancer on maintenance chemotherapy, off treatment and on treatment surveillance pathways, managing emergency presentations, providing supportive care as well as lead proceduralist for the general anaesthetic list performing lumbar punctures, intrathecal chemotherapy, bone marrow aspirate and trephine biopsies.
Kate has a strong interest in supportive care, AYA care and leads the Paediatric Oncology Evidence Based Practice Working Group. She is a member of the Cancer Nurse Society of Australia, Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer, Australia and New Zealand Children’s Haematology Oncology Group.
Senior clinical oncology pharmacist at the Royal Childrens Hospital Previous experience working in paediatric oncology in the United Kingdom.
Chris Williams is a Nurse Consultant with the Victorian Paediatric Integrated Cancer Service (PICS). Supported by the Sporting Chance Cancer Foundation, Chris works with nine regional health services across Victoria to deliver a formalised outreach and shared care program for children with cancer, and their families. Chris also works wthin the PICS on statewide quality project development, whilst also maintaining a day per week in a clinical bedside role within oncology outpatients at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne.
Lily Wong (BEng, BCom, MPH) is a Clinical Research Associate at Kids Oncology and Leukaemia Trials (KOALA), Sydney Childrens Hospital, and is responsible for the national coordination of investigator-initiated and collaborative group trials.
Sara Hulbert is an acting Clinical Nurse Educator in the Sydney Childrens’ Hospital Oncology, Haematology and Bone Marrow Transplant Inpatient Unit. Sara has worked in the oncology unit since 2013 and has a Graduate Certificate in Paediatric nursing studies as well as a Masters of Nursing.
Dr Sue Heatley gained her PhD in Transplant Immunology from the University of Melbourne. She was awarded a New Investigator Scholarship by the Haematology Society of Australia & New Zealand (HSANZ) to undertake a visiting fellow position in the laboratory of Prof Charles Mullighan at the St Judes Childrens Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, USA. In 2013, Sue began her current position at the South Australian Health & Medical Research Institute as a Research Fellow in the Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia Research group of Prof Deb White in the Cancer Program and is the current Kids Cancer Project Postdoctoral Fellow. Her current research interests are focussed on the genomic landscape of ALL and improving patient outcome through personalised medicine.
Ms Tennant is a current DPsych (Clinical) candidate at Deakin University. Ms Tennant’s research interest is focused on the application of VR-based interventions in acute hospital settings, particularly related to enhancing psychological wellbeing, adjustment to illness and treatment, supportive care and medical education, and aimed at rapidly translating evidence into clinical practice.
Her doctoral research involved a randomised controlled trial of a virtual reality (VR) therapeutic intervention with paediatric and adolescent patients undergoing cancer treatment conducted at The Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne, Australia. Ms Tennant is an early career researcher who aims to continue research in this novel research field, concerning the design, implementation and research translation of VR interventions within the oncology setting to enhance patient care and outcomes.
Farjana Afrin is a PhD student of Cancer Signalling Research Group at School of Biomedical Sciences & Pharmacy, University of Newcastle, Australia. She received the B.Sc and M.Sc in Pharmacy from Noakhali Science and Technology University, Bangladesh. She is a member of the Hunter Cancer Research Alliance (HCRA) since 2019.
Toby Trahair was appointed to the Kids Cancer Centre as a staff specialist in children’s haematology and oncology in 2006. The major focus of his research is on clinical trials and translational research. Clinical trials related research includes: being the Australian and New Zealand coordinating investigator of the International Society of Paediatric Oncology- Europe Neuroblastoma (SIOPEN) neuroblastoma clinical trials; (ii) trial study committees of the Australian Leukaemia & Lymphoma Group AYA ALL6 & 9 clinical trials; (iii) a member of the acute lymphoblastic leukaemia committee of the international BFM study group a leukaemia and lymphoma trials consortium and (iv) a member of the Advisory board of the Advances in Neuroblastoma Research Association. Current translational research projects conducted in conjunction with the Children’s Cancer Institute include (i) finding new treatments for ALK+ve inflammatory myofibroblastic tumours; (ii) the establishment of patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models for high risk neuroblastoma, (iii) the ERASE and (Evaluation of risk of acute lymphoblastic leukaemia treatment-related side-effects) ASSET (Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia Subtype and Side-Effects from Treatment) studies and (iv) the Zero Childhood Cancer Personalised Medicine Program, Kids Cancer Centre & Children’s Cancer Institute.
Dr. Vinod Subhash is a post-doctoral researcher at the Children’s Cancer Institute, Australia. His work focuses on the identification and pre-clinical validation of predictive and prognostic biomarkers. A major interest lies in developing DNA-based minimal residual disease (MRD) assays for pediatric cancers.
Claire Wakefield is a Professor at the School of Women’s and Children’s Health at UNSW Sydney. She is also Director of the Behavioural Sciences Unit at Sydney Children’s Hospital and Co-Director of the Kids to Adults Chronic Illness Alliance, which is a major network of child health experts across Australia.
Claire is particularly passionate about working at a global level. She holds multiple international leadership roles, including being Continental President Elect for Oceania for the International Society for Paediatric Oncology (SIOP). She also works closely with the World Health Organisation, supporting the Global Childhood Cancer Initiative.
Claire has received numerous awards for her work, including being named as the NSW Premier’s Outstanding Cancer Research Fellow of the Year.
Stacie Wang is a paediatric oncologist at RCH, Melbourne and completing a PhD in Immunotherapy at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research.
I’ve worked in Paediatric Oncology at The Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) for the past 5 years. Since working at RCH, I have completed a post graduate certificate in Cancer and Palliative Cate and Masters of Advanced Nursing Practice with University of Melbourne. I have worked in a variety of roles throughout my time at RCH most recently Clinical Support Nurse and Associate Nurse Unit Manger.
I throughly enjoy educating and empowering paediatric oncology nurses to deliver quality family centred care to patients and their families in such difficult times in their lives.
Christine works with A/Prof. Elizabeth Algar in the Genetics and Molecular Pathology Laboratory at the Hudson Institute establishing a diagnostic platform for molecular profiling of childhood brain tumours. She has previously completed a variety of projects studying different aspects of interferon signalling in development and cancer with Profs. Bryan Williams and Ganes Sen in Cleveland, OH, USA and with Dr. Daniel Gough at the Hudson Institute. She completed her PhD studying innate immune signalling at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research following undergraduate studies at the Australian National University.
Daniel is an paediatric infectious diseases physician and PhD student. His research interests include infection in immunocompromised children, invasive fungal infections and host-pathogen interactions.
A/Prof David Ziegler trained as a Fulbright Scholar at Harvard Medical School, and is now a paediatric oncologist at the Kids Cancer Centre, Sydney Children’s Hospital, Randwick. He treats children with all types of cancer and is Head of the brain tumour program and the clinical trials program. He is the Group Leader of Brain Tumour Group at the Children’s Cancer Institute, Australia, focusing on development of novel targeted therapies for childhood brain cancers. He leads the national childhood cancer personalised medicine trial.
Cinzia is a senior clinical neuropsychologist in the psycho-oncology program, Children’s Cancer Centre at the RCH. She is also a research fellow with the Murdoch children’s Research institute. Cinzia coordinates the clinical neuropsychology program for the CCC, and oversees the neurocognitive arms of several clinical trials.
Jenny Davies is enrolled in a PhD at Curtin University. Her thesis title is: ‘Multiple perspectives of people living and working with a child with cancer: A qualitative analysis using an ecological framework’. This research aims to explore families’ and healthcare professionals’ experiences of caring for a child with a cancer diagnosis to develop evidence-based interventions to improve psychosocial outcomes.
Jenny completed her honours thesis on ‘Mothers’ Experiences of Life after their Child had Completed Cancer Treatment’, which received first class Honours. A manuscript is currently under review. Jenny worked in health care management for 15 years within tertiary and primary settings, focusing on service delivery improvements. Jenny has lived experience as a mother of a childhood cancer survivor.
Dr Dong-Anh Khuong-Quang is a molecular oncologist in the Zero Childhood Cancer program and a paediatric oncologist in the Childrens Cancer Centre at the Royal Childrens Hospital Melbourne. Dr Khuong-Quang obtained her medical degree with a specialisation in Paediatrics from the University Paris-Descartes 5 in France, and completed her training in paediatric oncology at the Royal Childrens Hospital. She also received her PhD in Human Genetics from McGill University in Canada, where she worked on molecular characterisation of paediatric high grade gliomas in the laboratory of Prof. Nada Jabado. She joined the Zero team in 2017 to provide clinical and translational expertise to PRISM study.
Dr Azimi is a cancer cell biologist with extensive experience in drug discovery and development. He is currently a lecturer in Pharmaceutical Science at the School of Pharmacy and Pharmacology, University of Tasmania. He conducts research on brain cancer, brain metastasis, and breast cancer. His research spans from the laboratory to the clinic to improve our understanding of cancer biology and to identify putative therapeutics for cancer treatment. He has expertise in cancer hypoxia, calcium signalling, epithelial-mesenchymal plasticity, and high-throughput drug screening.
Andrew has been nursing at the Kids Cancer Centre at Sydney Childrens Hospital since 2010 and has been the Clinical Nurse Educator on the unit since 2016. He completed a Masters of Nursing with a clinical and teaching specialisation in 2017. Andrew has worked across various roles in education, innovation and research. He has previously presented posters at the ANZCHOG ASM (2017) and a speaker presentation at Australasian Nurses Education Conference (2017). Andrew has a publication in the journal Clinical Transplantation reviewing literature around Engraftment Syndrome following HSCT. Andrew is passionate about improving the hospital journey and health outcomes for hospitalised children and believes this can be achieved through utilising a quality, integrated with research, to guide clinical practice.
Dr Lucy Cain is a paediatric oncology trainee currently working as the Transplant and Cellular Therapy Fellow at Sydney Children’s Hospital, Randwick.
Laura is the BMT Coordinator at the Transplant & Cellular Therapies Program in Sydney Childrens Hospital, Randwick. She is passionate about quality improvement and safety of recipients and donors. She has a particular interest in the human leukocyte antigen and its implications in donor selection.
Michaela Comito is a clinical paediatric dietitian at the Royal Children’s Hospital, with a keen interest in optimising the nutritional status of children undergoing cancer treatment.
Kristie Day is a Paediatric Oncology pharmacist at John Hunter Hospital. Trained at the University of Newcastle, she has worked at John Hunter for 10 years- primarily in the area of paediatric oncology and haematology. She is very patient focussed and has been involved in the procurement of targeted therapies.
Paediatric oncology fellow at the Royal Childrens Hospital Victoria.
Charlotte is a final year PhD Candidate in the Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia Research Group at the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI). Her research investigates therapeutic approaches and mechanisms of drug resistance in the setting of high-risk subtypes of acute lymphoblastic leukaemia involving Janus kinase 2 alterations.
Rebecca Doyle is a Nurse Researcher with the Queensland Specialist Immunisation Service at CHQ, an Adjunct Research Fellow at Griffith University, and a current member of the CHQ Human Research Ethics Committee. She has a background in Paediatric Intensive Care nursing and and has been working in paediatric research for the past 7 years in various roles with UQ, QUT and CHQ. Rebecca’s research interests include infectious diseases, vaccine preventable diseases and ethical aspects of research in children. Rebecca has recently submitted her thesis as part of a Master of Medical Research with Griffith Uni. Her research project investigated whether the prohibition of deferred consent in clinical trials in critical care contributes to research bias.
Kristyn is a senior paediatric dietitian currently working at The Royal Childrens Hospital, Melbourne. She has over 16 years experience as a clinical paediatric dietitian and has worked in oncology as a clinical lead dietitian, specialising in the areas of solid and brain tumours, for the past 8 years. She has a keen interest in the impact of nutrition support in paediatric patients with solid and brain tumours and the effect of aggressive cancer treatments on their nutritional status.
Michelle Forgione is a PhD candidate in Prof Deborah White’s Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) research lab at SAHMRI. Her interests include KMT2A and MLLT10-rearranged leukaemia, and her research focuses on establishing precision medicine approaches to improve outcomes for patients with ALL.
Dr Ruth Gauden is a Paediatric Rehabilitation Fellow at the Royal Childrens Hospital, Melbourne. She was admitted as a Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians in General Paediatrics in 2020 and has acquired clinical experience from a diverse range of tertiary and regional centres across Australia. Dr Gauden was the recipient of the Menzies Research Institute Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program Scholarship. She is a published author with her research presented at national and international scientific conferences. Her research focuses on oncological treatment late effects and patient education to better support patients and their families.
