This week (Tuesday), Victoria’s Minister for Innovation, Medical Research and the Digital Economy, Hon Jaala Pulford, visited the Turner Institute for Brain and Mental Health to meet its researchers and learn first-hand about their groundbreaking work.
The visit was an opportunity to showcase the Turner Institute’s clinics, where research findings are translated into clinical practice.
Minister Pulford was received by the Dean of the Monash School of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, Professor Christina Mitchell, who congratulated the Victoria State Government on its recent launch Research Strategy in Health and Medicine: 2022-2032.
“There is tremendous alignment with our innovative technologies and discoveries to identify new ways to improve the health of all Victorians and beyond,” said Professor Mitchell.
The Turner Institute has many examples of this alignment with its community-based approach to lifespan.
“At the Turner Institute, we actively pursue three core themes: Growing Well, Living Well, and Aging Well to build resilient, healthy brains early in life, to develop tools that promote and maintain brain and mental health throughout life. time,” said the director. of the Turner Institute, professor kim cornish said.
Minister Pulford met with several senior researchers working in the fields of preventative mental and brain health while touring the Turner facility.
They included;
– Associate Professor Matt Pass who discussed the links between sleep and dementia.
– Assoc. Professor Yen Ying Lim who spoke about the recently awarded ARC Industrial Transformation Training Center for Optimal Aging.
– Assoc. Professor Marie Yap on youth mental health and parenting programs.
The Minister was taken through a sleep research demonstration at the Center for Sleep and Circadian Medicine, which highlighted the vast amount of data that can be collected from these controlled environments. The multidisciplinary program aims to investigate the contribution of sleep regulatory processes in wake function, health and safety.
Professor Cornish told Minister Pulford that Turner has already made a significant impact since it was launched three years ago.
And, he said, the pioneering “Living Lab” set to start in 2023 will break new ground again, by creating a series of culturally diverse cohorts across the Development, Living and Aging Well pillars, in Melbourne’s South East Corridor for longitudinal, studies co-designed by the community to promote brain and mental health.
“The idea behind this approach is to have a well-defined testbed and immediate access to the community where we can test co-designed initiatives before scaling and translating further across Australia and internationally,” said Professor Cornish.
“Among other things, this important and timely project will help measure the impact of the pandemic on the mental health of an entire population.
“We want to identify and treat potential problems early, and ideally prevent them, whether they are related to COVID or not,” Professor Cornish said.
The study will follow thousands of residents of all age groups over a 10-year period, monitoring and treating signs of mental illness, dementia and other brain conditions.
“It’s a very, very exciting time to be at the Turner.”
For more information about the Turner Institute, see our website.
It was a wonderful opportunity to formally introduce the Minister @jaalapulford to the Turner Institute at our Sleep and Circadian Medicine facility on Tuesday this week along with Distinguished Prof. @cornish_kimAP James Courtney, AP Matt Pass, AP @yenyinglim and PA @drmarieyap.
About Monash University
Monash University is the largest university in Australia with over 80,000 students. In the 60 years since its founding, it has developed a reputation for world-leading high-impact research, quality teaching, and inspiring innovation.
With four campuses in Australia and a presence in Malaysia, China, India, Indonesia and Italy, it is one of the most internationalized Australian universities.
As a leading international medical research university with Australia’s largest medical school and integration with leading Australian teaching hospitals, we consistently rank among the top 50 universities in the world for clinical, preclinical and health sciences.
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