The Research Endowment Fund (REF) is an annual competitive financial grant round to support research activity of high quality across St Vincent's Hospital Melbourne campuses.
Key Dates
Applications Open: 1st August 2024
Applications Close: 9th September 2024
Awards Presentation: 10 December 2024
Deeds of Agreement: December 2024/January 2025
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Keynote speech: A Medical Entrepreneurship Journey
presented by Dr Hugo Stephenson, Co-Founder and Executive Chair, TrialScreen
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2024 REF Grant Recipients
for Research Projects Commencing in February 2025
Category A: Research Buy-Out Time for Clinicians (part-time)
| Name | Department | Title of Project | Discipline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Emma Fredrickson | HIP Young Adult Complex Disability Service | Pressure Mapping in Complex Seating for Adults with Cerebral Palsy: What, when and for whom? | Allied Health |
| Kim Lunardi | Nutrition | Expanding Horizons: Evaluating the Impact of Advanced Scope of Practice for Dietitians in Gastrostomy Care in Regional Victoria. | Allied Health |
| Emma Flanagan | Gastroenterology | The Baby Inflammatory Bowel Disease Microbiome (BABYCINO) Study: Dietary Intervention in Mothers with Inflammatory Bowel Disease, to Prevent Infant Microbial Dysbiosis | Clinical |
| Linda Yang | Gastroenterology | Artificial Intelligence in Inflammatory Bowel Disease-associated Dysplasia (AID study) | Clinical |
| Melissa Lee | Endocrinology and Diabetes | Integrating wearable diabetes technologies into inpatient care | Clinical |
| Cenyi Ai | Addiction Medicine | Outpatient adjunctive treatment of Alcohol-Withdrawal Syndrome using the GABA transaminase inhibitor vigabatrin | Nursing |
| Donna Hristodoulidis | Mental Health | Enhancing Recovery-Oriented Care in Acute Mental Health Units: Challenges, Communication, and the Role of Protected Engagement Time (PET). | Nursing |
Category B: Support or Seeding Grants for Research Projects
| Name | Department | Title of Project | Discipline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mollie Wilson | Palliative Medicine | Mapping the Impact of Consumer and Community Involvement in Palliative Care | Allied Health |
| Yvonne Mak-Yuen | Occupational Therapy | SMOOTH: Systematic Measurement of Outcomes in Occupational Therapy Health Services | Allied Health |
| Aleksandar Dobric | Vascular Biology, St Vincent's Institute of Medical Research | Developing a liver patch to fight fatty liver disease | Basic Science |
| Jarmon Lees | O'Brien Institute, St Vincent's Institute of Medical Research | Transforming Diabetes Care: Cardiorenal Interactions in a Pre-Clinical Model for Therapeutic Discovery | Basic Science |
| Jennifer McRae | Immunology Research Centre | Targeting the complement lectin pathway to attenuate fibrosis of the kidney following ischemia-reperfusion injury. | Basic Science |
| Julie Nigro | Immunology Research Centre | Targeting lipid metabolism in hepatocellular carcinoma | Basic Science |
| Kaylene Cheng | Immunology Research Centre | Development of a new diagnostic tool for sepsis patients based on the function of innate immune cells including sTREM-1 and sST-2 | Basic Science |
| Kegan Moneghetti | Cardiology | Stepping towards precision rehabilitation; Establishing benefits and safety of early cardiac rehabilitation in diabetics post acute coronary syndrome. | Clinical |
| Joshua De Bono | Cardiothoracics | Iron Heart (Fe Heart) | Clinical |
| Jake Burnett | Emergency Department | Enhancing Care for Elderly Patients Presenting with Concussion to the Emergency Department | Clinical |
| Richard MacIsaac | Endocrinology and Diabetes | Exploring the role of anti-nephrin antibodies in diabetic kidney disease | Clinical |
| Glenn Ward | Endocrinology and Diabetes | Assessing the relationship between Beta Cell Function, and Islet Autoantibodies following Islet Cell Transplantation in Type 1 Diabetes | Clinical |
| Kumar Visvanathan | Immunology Research Centre | Using the unique differences between HBV and HCV immunology to examine cancer progression and identify new therapeutic targets for liver cancer | Clinical |
| Jean Lee | Medical Imaging | Detection of brain injuries using Machine Learning (ML) and portable low-field magnetic resonance imaging in patients with acquired brain injury: A proof-of-concept study | Clinical |
| VIjaya Sundararajan | Medicine | Do socially complex patient groups have a higher disease burden and lower survival than do general patients? | Clinical |
| David Marco | Palliative Care | Palliative care and Ambulance Victoria: New partnerships to improve urgent care in advanced illness | Clinical |
| Peter Hudson | Palliative Care | PalliMate: improving the quality of life of people with serious illness and their primary family carer together | Clinical |
| Christina Trambas | Pathology | Development of a Customised Immunoassay to Detect Troponin I Bound to Autoantibodies | Clinical |
| Brett Knowles | Upper Gastrointestinal and Hepatobiliary Surgery | Optimization of Dose and Timing of Indocyanine Green in Laparoscopic Cholecystectomies | Clinical |
| Kim Choate | Anaesthesia and Acute Pain Medicine | Can perioperative pain education, behavioural change and analgesic reduction improve post-operative pain experience (outcomes) of complex pain patients? | Nursing |
Category C: The Margaret Young Bequest
| Name | Department | Title of Project | Discipline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Amanda Saracino | Rheumatology | Unraveling the inciting molecular signatures in scleroderma; towards new treatment targets and personalised therapies. | Clinical |
REF Resources
Please see link below to view the presentation of 'Research Endowment Fund; What is it and how to apply?"
Past REF Recipient
If you have received a REF grant previously and have not submitted a Final report, please download the Progress/Final report and send a Final report for every grant received to the email address found at the bottom of this page
