UQGP Research

UQGP Research Steering Committee

The UQGP Research Steering Committee hosts annual meetings to prioritise research questions and to provide progress updates on current projects.

• UQGP Research Director - Professsor Katharine Wallis
• UQGP Research GP liaison - Dr Rory Melville
• 3 elected members from general practice
• 2 community representatives
• Representative from a GP college

Academic Advisory Committee

• Professor Katharine Wallis
• A/Professor Deb Askew
• Dr Rory Melville

Chair

Professor Katharine Wallis

Mayne Professor and Head, Mayne Academy of General Practice and Head, General Practice Clinical Unit, Medical School

Katharine is a Fellow of both the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine and the Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners currently practising part-time as a GP on the Gold Coast. Katharine’s research focuses on patient safety in primary care, in particular supporting safer prescribing in general practice.

Committee Members

Associate Professor Riitta Partanen

Riitta is the Director of The University of Queensland Rural Clinical School and is based at the Hervey Bay Regional Clinical Unit. Riitta is also a General Practitioner and has served her community of Maryborough since 1996. Riitta’s research interest areas include rural medical education, rural medical workforce as well as the management of chronic conditions in the regional and rural context. Riitta is currently completing her PhD on geographical narcissism during medical education and training that influence prevocational doctors for their workplace locations choices. Riitta is passionate about rural medical education and training and through both her academic leadership and research she is leading change that aims to improve the medical workforce shortage in rural Queensland and ensure equitable access to health care for regional, rural, and remote communities.

Dr Andrew Webster

Andrew is a specialist General Practitioner (FRACGP) who relocated to Brisbane in 2023 after spending most of his early career in the Northern Territory. He has worked as a GP in rural Western Australia and the Northern Territory, including as the Chief Medical Officer of Danila Dilba Health Service in Darwin. 
Andrew's background in primary care management and administration inform his research interests which are focused on using clinical and administrative data to understand variations in access to primary health care.

Dr John Adie

John a New Zealand and Australian trained general practitioner (GP), Rural and Remote GP and Urgent Care Physician. He has had leadership roles for over ten Urgent Care Clinic (UCC) start-ups in Australasia. His current roles include Associate Professor of Urgent Care at the University of the Sunshine Coast School of Health, RACGP ‘Urgent and emergent presentations to primary care’ Special Interest Group chair and RNZCUC Australian Convenor representing the college on the Australian Government Department of Health National UCC Operational Advisory Group. John is committed to promoting healthy Integrated Primacy Care Centres and moving as much care of patients as possible from secondary to primary care and primary care to nursing and allied health. Part of this commitment includes ensuring vocational registration, training, quality, safety, and supervision.

Dr Katelin Haynes

Katelin is passionate about translating science into change, especially to improve health equity.
Katelin has held leadership positions in the Queensland not for profit sector for the past 8 years, including most recently as CEO of Hepatitis Queensland.
Katelin holds a Bachelor of Science, an MBA and a PhD in medical research from The University of Queensland where she also contributes as a member of their ChangeMakers alumni advisory board.

Rachelle Foreman

Rachelle is Executive Manager | Health Systems Improvement at Brisbane North Primary health Network (PHN), working to develop strategic and collaborative approaches to support a more integrated system of health care, with a particular focus on primary care, allied health and the hospital interface. Rachelle is an allied health professional with a Masters of Philosophy (Research) in population health and a clinical Masters of Scientific Studies from The University of Queensland. She has worked in health and social services for over 20 years in the ‘for purpose’ and public sectors. She is extremely passionate about the consumer voice being front and centre in developing models and systems of health care and is a board director of Health Consumers Queensland.

Elizabeth Miller

Elizabeth holds a BBehSc (Hons Psych) and has completed an IAP2 Certificate in Community Engagement and a Recovery-Oriented Mentoring Program in Mental Health.

She has been involved in various research projects as a Research Officer with the UQ School of Medicine at Herston and Ipswich campuses.  Previously her employment experience included education and quality improvement work in primary care as a Manager with the National Primary Care Collaboratives Program.  Elizabeth served for two terms on the Brisbane South PHN Community Advisory Council.

Currently she is engaged as a co-researcher on a PhD project with a small research team led by an OT and two Academics which has been investigating the consumer and staff capabilities required for successful partnerships in healthcare quality improvement. 

Elizabeth is also involved as a Consumer Partner at National, State and Local healthcare levels with the Australian Commission for Quality and Safety in Healthcare, the General Medicine Clinical Network (Qld. Health), the Metro South Hospital and Health Service, and the Australian Frailty Network.  She is keen to see an increase in practice-based research which will improve primary health care and outcomes for patients.